BILL GATES ON ENERGY

p30
BRIEFING
THE FUTURE
OF FUELS
p87

THE NEXT
GENERATION
OF TECHNOLOGY
Say Hello to
35 Innovators
Under 35
p43

4chan’s
Radical
Opacity
p82

Discovering the
Genes Behind
Diseases
p76
PLUS
How to
The Authority on the
Hack a Car
p106
Future of Technology
October 2010
www.technologyreview.com

Sep10 Cover.indd 1 8/11/10 3:19 PM

 ©2010 General Motors. Cadillac® CTS® Nürburgring®

Untitled-2 2 8/5/10 2:51 PM

 THERE IS THE CURVE
AND THEN THERE’S
AHEAD OF THE CURVE.

Untitled-2 3 8/5/10 2:51 PM

 Harry Atwater Nazeer Bhore Ed Boyden Jose Bravo Brett Brewer Scott Elrod Kris go
Caltech Exxon Mobil MIT Media Lab Shell Global Solutions Microsoft Live Labs Palo Alto Research Center Infosy

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 Contents Vo lum e 1 1 3 , N um ber 5

43 The TR35 photo Essay

34 Living Data
Get a preview of what the next generation of The three-story-high AlloSphere
technology looks like in our annual selection of the creates unique visualizations.
world’s top innovators under the age of 35. By Tom Simonite
■ www.technologyreview.com/tr35 See video profiles of the TR35. ■ www.technologyreview.com/
photoessay
76 A Family Mystery,
See the AlloSphere in action.

Solved by a Genome BriEfing

How one doctor’s quest to understand his
87–98 Fuels
neurological disorder illuminates the promise Even with the push for renew-
of DNA sequencing. able energy, demand for
By em i ly s i NG e r fossil fuels is still growing.
covEr

Robotic hand invented by Aaron
Dollar, one of this year’s TR35.
Photo by Porter Gifford.
82 Radical Opacity
rEviEws
With 4chan, Christopher “moot” Poole created 100 Cash for
an online community where people revel in Infrastructure
anonymity. Can he turn his insights into profits? What happens after the federal
By Juli A N D i b be ll stimulus funding for energy runs
out? By David Rotman

103 Down the Tubes

8 Letters
12 From the Editor
notEBooks
10 Finding People to
Reinvent the World
How to choose startups.
By Wesley Chan
10 Why Privacy
Is Not Dead
Privacy controls on the Web
need to consider social context.
By Danah Boyd
11 Communicating
During a Crisis
Social software can help
during and after a catas-
trophe. By David Kobia
How free streaming
graphiti
video threatens the porn
28 Taking Stock of the industry. By Scott Fayner
Stimulus
Follow the money for technology
hack
in the American Recovery and
Reinvestment Act. 106 Taking Over a Car
By Tommy McCall Researchers “break in” with
and Matt Mahoney software and a laptop.
By Erica Naone
■ www.technologyreview.com/
graphiti View an interactive version.
DEmo
108 Remaking Life
How researchers made the
first viable cell with a synthetic
genome. By Katherine Bourzac
■ www.technologyreview.com/
demo See a video about
making artificial life.
from thE LaBs

112 Biomedicine
to markEt
113 Information
21–26 Technology
Technology 114 Materials
Commercialized
Smart car charger, telepresence Q&a
robot, easier EEGs, body tracking 38 yEars ago in TR
30 Bill Gates
for games, CO2 emissions moni-
The cofounder of Microsoft talks 116 Signs of the Times
tor, and more. A year before the oil shock of
energy. By Jason Pontin
1973, a geologist warned of the
coming energy crisis.
By Matt Mahoney

4 t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w s e p t e m b e r / o c t o b e r 2010

Sept10 ToC.indd 4 8/12/10 10:48 AM

 LET’S GO FURTHER ON ONE GALLON OF FUEL.
We must learn to use energy more efficiently. For 25 years, the Shell Eco-marathon® has
supported teams worldwide who explore ways to maximize fuel economy. Last year’s
winner was capable of traveling 8,870 miles on the equivalent of one gallon of fuel.
This spirit epitomizes our relationship with car manufacturers, finding ways to make cars
more efficient. And it’s typical of our ambition to help build a better energy future.
Let’s go. www.shell.us/letsgo

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6 t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w s e p t e m b e r / o c t o b e r 2010

Sept10 Masthead.indd 6 8/9/10 3:50 PM

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Untitled-2 1 7/29/10 3:16 PM

 letters and comments

Moving toward a cure years, instead of the next few decades. And nomic value of selling and installing solar
Jon Cohen’s article (“Can AIDS Be Cured?” wouldn’t that be something? panels is captured within the U.S.
July/August 2010) provided a refreshingly Kate Krauss Douglas Arent
optimistic view regarding the potential to Philadelphia, PA Executive Director, Joint Institute for Strate-
cure HIV infection. As vice president and gic Energy Analysis, National Renewable Energy
director of research at amfAR, the Foun- Solar iSSueS Laboratory, Golden, CO
dation for AIDS Research, I can say we The fine articles on solar energy in the July/ James Sweeney
have long shared such optimism. Just as August 2010 issue (“Solar’s Great Leap For- Director, Precourt Energy Efficiency Center,
current treatment combines several agents ward” and “The German Experiment”) Stanford University, Stanford, CA
for suppression of the virus, it’s likely that a highlight two renewable-energy success
cure will combine many approaches. This stories, but the use of the term “grid parity” unManned MiSSionS More FeaSible
thoughtful article helps to dispel the skepti- is misleading. It implies that solar energy It is understandable that Buzz Aldrin, the
cism that hinders progress in this area and cannot compete with coal and petroleum. second man to set foot on the moon, would
highlights the need for sufficient resources But when factors such as global warming, advocate a permanent human presence on
and coördinated efforts that will lead to an the Gulf oil cleanup, and the huge subsidies Mars (Q&A, July/August 2010). But stating
AIDS cure. we give petroleum are taken into account, that we need a place to go “in case some-
Rowena Johnston solar already surpasses grid parity. Defin- body or something blows up Earth,” and
New York, NY ing grid parity is a good step to making bet- that human travelers be given one-way tick-
ter decisions for the future. ets, is juvenile. As renowned space leader
Congratulations to Technology Review for Steve Waller Si Ramo has argued, the logistics and
being the first publication to cover the Washington, DC cost of manned missions to Mars would
renewed drive to find a cure for AIDS. be overwhelming, and the dangers to the
As executive director of the AIDS Policy “Solar’s Great Leap Forward,” while describ- astronauts would be unacceptable. Ramo
Project, I have seen this research accelerate ing the successes of China’s Suntech, sug- also states that no scientific questions
and evolve in just the past two gests opportunities that still have been raised that cannot be addressed
years. However, funding for are open to U.S. companies. equally well by robotic spacecraft.
it has not. The NIH devotes First, although an innova- Michael Horstein
only 3 percent of its AIDS tive process design that takes Los Angeles, CA
research budget to a cure; it advantage of low-cost labor
spends nine times more on has sharply reduced Suntech’s SaFety in the cloud
AIDS vaccines. Money is cost of producing multicrys- “Moore’s Outlaws” (July/August 2010)
needed for short pilot studies talline photovoltaic panels, highlights the danger posed by attackers
to test therapies in humans, U.S. companies can use other in cyberspace and makes the case for
among other projects. Yet if technologies that may have deploying stronger cyber security mea-
we can fund the science prop- July/August ’10 even lower costs. Second, only sures. As researchers at Microsoft
erly, fast-track therapies ready half the cost of a solar instal- Research, we believe machines need to be
for clinical trials, and untangle the red tape lation comes from the solar panels. U.S. re-architected to protect against intrusion
for researchers, there is a real chance to companies can prosper by driving down and confine the effects of an attack. This
develop a workable cure in the next several the balance of system and installation costs. is critical on all machines but mandatory
Third, the large-scale penetration of solar when using shared infrastructure, partic-
in the electric grid will require innovations ularly as sensitive health and financial
join the diScuSSion, or contact uS in systems integration and management information moves to the cloud. Safe prac-
■ technologyreview.com/community of intermittency, providing more business tices for preserving confidentiality of data
e-mail letters@technologyreview.com
opportunities. Finally, innovations in busi- through encryption should be employed.
write Technology Review, One Main Street,
ness models, including clean-energy bonds, Transactions between parties on the Inter-
13th Floor, Cambridge, MA 02142
Fax 617-475-8043 offer chances for U.S. leadership. As solar net and within a machine should be rou-
Please include your address, telephone number, panels mature as a commodity market, we tinely authenticated. Widespread use of
and e-mail address. Letters may be edited for may find manufacturing predominantly cryptographic techniques will not protect
both clarity and length. outside the U.S., while most of the eco- against everything (e.g., social-engineering

8 letters and comments t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w s e p t e m b e r / o c t o b e r 2010

Sept10 Letters.indd 8 8/9/10 10:53 AM

 Can new uses for phaser
attacks aiming to steal identities), but it data measurements
will help to isolate and identify vulnera-
bilities.
Kristin Lauter and John Manferdelli
prevent blackouts?
Redmond, WA

FaSter connectionS
Your brilliant July/August 2010 Graphiti
on broadband penetration created a con-
troversial response in my Emerging Mar-
kets Business Intelligence team at Cisco.
We abandoned the “cost” dimensions in
our analysis of global broadband penetra-
tion because the data for emerging-market
countries seem unreliable. Also, in larger
countries, broadband costs and penetra-
tion vary within the country. For example,
recent data for Russia show the cost of
broadband varying from 1.2 percent of an
average salary in Moscow and St. Peters-
burg to 15 to 20 percent in more remote
Find the latest power and energy
parts of the country. The study notes that research in IEEE Xplore
higher prices are caused by lack of compe-
tition in the regions, keeping penetration Wherever you find the most advanced power and
well behind what we see in the major cities. energy technology, chances are you’ll find the IEEE
Katya Wilkins
Xplore digital library. That’s because IEEE Xplore is filled
Feltham, United Kingdom
with the latest research on everything from energy
Is this a fair comparison? Many of these conversion to superconductors—to building fail-safe
www
countries have smaller areas or different power grids.
population densities, which can affect the met-
rics. It may be easier to roll out the necessary When it comes to power and energy, the research
communication equipment in a smaller area to that matters is in IEEE Xplore.
reach a larger density of users.
ebresie See for yourself. Read “Wanted: A More Intelligent
(Eric Bresie, Grapevine, TX) Grid” only in IEEE Xplore.

Unfortunately there is no “fair” comparison in

Try IEEE Xplore free—
a metric like this. It will be more capital inten-
sive to lay cables where the distances between visit www.ieee.org/bettergrid
subscribers are farther. But access should be
similar assuming the same generation of equip-
ment is serving similar numbers of subscribers.
For example, Manhattan has a similar urban
density to Japan, but Manhattan has slower and
pricier broadband. There is no justification for it
beyond regulatory and competitive differences. IEEE Xplore® Digital Library
colinnwn Information driving innovation
(Joel Colin Gebhart, Dallas, TX)

w w w . t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w . c o m
09-CRS-0223j-Power-4.625x9.625-Final-2010.indd 1 11/23/09 2:11:10 PM

Sept10 Letters.indd 9 8/9/10 10:53 AM

 noteBooks
Expert opinion
V e n t u r e Ca p i ta l
Finding People
to Reinvent
the World
ChoosinG startups to
inVest in is a hunt for
people as muCh as teCh-
noloGy, says Wesley Chan.
A
s an investment partner with Google
Ventures, I am often asked how I
decide which startups to back.
An encounter in a tiny San Diego
office in mid-2004 helps illustrate my
answer. There I met Paul, Brett, Jack,
and Scott, the scrappiest and most cre-
ative founders I had ever seen. They
constructed their own office furniture
to save money. To increase awareness
of their product, they would sneak into
trade-show parties sponsored by well-
funded competitors and bribe bartenders
to distribute hip-looking decals. With-
out much money in the bank and under
heavy competition from a dominant
market leader, they proved themselves
able not only to survive but to thrive.
They had created a service that was well
designed and had immense potential.
They knew exactly how to adapt their
10 notebooks
Sept10 Notebooks.indd 10
product to handle 10 times as many users
when success came, but they built it with-
out spending on expensive equipment to
serve users they had not yet acquired.
Six months later I led the acquisition
of their startup, Urchin Software, which
became the inspiration and foundation
for one of our most successful products,
Google Analytics. But for all its founders’
good points, acquiring the company was
not the obvious choice. Skeptics inside
Google pointed out that Urchin was
not the market leader or even the best-
known among the 30 analytics providers
we considered. I had to pound my fist on
the table in many meetings, declaring
that this was the right horse to back.
When people ask why I was so certain,
my response harks back to that meeting
in San Diego. Urchin’s founders, who
are all still with Google, may not have
had the best-performing startup, but
they were the best founding team around.
Great founders need the technical apti-
tude, motivation, and personal skills to
make a product take off. They proved
they had all that when, 72 hours after it
launched, Google Analytics was over-
whelmed by demand. Paul and his team
rapidly recruited and motivated new tal-
ent to rearchitect the service’s back end.
Analytics opened shortly afterward with
the capacity to handle an order of magni-
tude more traffic. Great founders under-
stand how to deal with unprecedented
issues and come out ahead.
They also use feedback from users
and the market to dramatically increase
their product’s growth. For example, we
decided to offer Analytics free of charge
when we realized that this would allow
Google to engage online advertisers it
hadn’t been able to reach before.
So how do I invest at Google Ven-
tures? When I fund a company, I’m look-
ing for people with the kind of potential
that Urchin’s founders displayed:
extraordinary entrepreneurs who can
build game-changing products.
Wesley Chan is a partner at GooGle Ven-
tures, the Company’s Venture Capital inVest-
ment arm. he is one of the 2010 tr35 (p. 56).
soCial n etWor ki nG
Why Privacy Is
Not Dead
the Way priVaCy is
enCoded into softWare
doesn’t matCh the Way We
handle it in real life, says
danah Boyd.
E
ach time Facebook’s privacy set-
tings change or a technology makes
personal information available to new
audiences, people scream foul. Each time,
their cries seem to fall on deaf ears.
The reason for this disconnect is that
in a computational world, privacy is
often implemented through access con-
trol. Yet privacy is not simply about con-
trolling access. It’s about understanding a
social context, having a sense of how our
information is passed around by others,
and sharing accordingly. As social media
n i c k r e d dyh o f f
mature, we must rethink how we encode
privacy into our systems.
Privacy is not in opposition to speak-
t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w s e p t e m b e r / o c t o b e r 2010
8/11/10 9:47 AM
 ing in public. We speak privately in pub-
lic all the time. Sitting in a restaurant,
we have intimate conversations know-
ing that the waitress may overhear. We
count on what Erving Goffman called
“civil inattention”: people will politely
ignore us, and even if they listen they
won’t join in, because doing so violates
social norms. Of course, if a close friend
sits at the neighboring table, everything
changes. Whether an environment is
public or not is beside the point. It’s the
situation that matters.
Whenever we speak in face-to-face
settings, we modify our communication
on the basis of cues like who’s present
and how far our voices carry. We negoti-
ate privacy explicitly—“Please don’t tell
anyone”—or through tacit understanding.
Sometimes, this fails. A friend might gos-
sip behind our back or fail to understand
what we thought was implied. Such
incidents make us question our interpre-
tation of the situation or the trustworthi-
ness of the friend.
All this also applies online, but with
additional complications. Digital walls
do almost have ears; they listen, record,
and share our messages. Before we can
communicate appropriately in a social
environment like Facebook or Twitter,
we must develop a sense for how and
what people share.
When the privacy options available to
us change, we are more likely to question
the system than to alter our own behavior.
But such changes strain our relationships
and undermine our ability to navigate
broad social norms. People who can be
whoever they want, wherever they want,
are a privileged minority.
As social media become more embed-
ded in everyday society, the mismatch
between the rule-based privacy that soft-
ware offers and the subtler, intuitive ways
that humans understand the concept will
increasingly cause cultural collisions and
social slips. But people will not abandon
social media, nor will privacy disappear.
w w w . t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w . c o m
Sept10 Notebooks.indd 11
They will simply work harder to carve out
a space for privacy as they understand
it and to maintain control, whether by
using pseudonyms or speaking in code.
Instead of forcing users to do that, why
not make our social software support the
way we naturally handle privacy? There
is much to be said for allowing the sun-
light of diversity to shine. But too much
sunlight scorches the earth. Let’s create a
forest, not a desert.
danah Boyd is a soCial-media researCher at
miCrosoft researCh neW enGland, a felloW
at harVard uniVersity’s Berkman Center for
internet and soCiety, and a memBer of the
2010 tr35 (p. 49).
C r oW d s o u r C i n G
Communicating
During a Crisis
soCial softWare, says
daVid koBia, Can help
durinG a Catastrophe—
and after.
U
shahidi was created in response to
the crisis after the failed elections in
Kenya in 2007. In our quest to minimize
the impact of riots and unrest around the
country, we developed a free open-source
platform that allows people to report
incidents they witness. Their reports
are added to an online map that rap-
idly becomes a source for information
neglected by media and governments.
Watching Ushahidi in use after disas-
ters like the Haitian earthquake has
shown that in a crisis, the barriers of com-
placency and cultural indifference break
down. People directly, indirectly, and
even remotely involved in a situation are
suddenly open to collaborating and shar-
ing. It is at this moment that the crowd is
the most powerful. Once the crisis is over,
though, apathy breaks up this cohesion.
With Ushahidi, in keeping with a pattern
seen in other social media, a mere 1 per-
cent of participants actively contribute
new content, 9 percent interact with it,
and the other 90 percent are mere view-
ers. These ratios slide further toward pas-
sive viewing once an event is no longer
front-page news. Finding ways to help
keep the crowd engaged beyond the crisis
is one of our greatest challenges.
Like anyone trying to promote user
engagement, we must relentlessly remind
people of our message to encourage them
to use the service. We have to connect
different sources of information that oth-
erwise would never be linked. Adapting
Ushahidi to incorporate social media is
a big part of our strategy: it encourages
user-generated content and gives every-
one a front-row seat as events unfold.
After a user reports a crime or a dan-
gerous situation, the balance between
give and take is crucial. A first responder
can take action if appropriate, or the
person who reported the event can sign
up for alerts of similar events reported by
others nearby. All this is made possible
by tools like text messaging and mobile-
phone applications that reduce the barri-
ers to participation.
Ushahidi has often been described
as simply a map with red dots. That is
not far from the truth. But people often
forget that behind each of those dots is a
human experience—perhaps a life or lives
that have been touched by disaster.
daVid koBia is direCtor of teChnoloGy deVel-
opment for ushahidi and a memBer of the
2010 tr35 (p. 44).
notebooks 11
8/11/10 9:47 AM
 from the editor
35 Innovators under 35
how and why we choose our young leaders
E
very year, Technology Review lauds 35 innovators under
the age of 35. They are chosen because they are trans-
forming technology.
Our process for selecting the innovators is rigorous—
not to mention arduous for our editors. We seek nomi-
nations more than six months before we announce the
winners. Candidates, who may come from either industry
or the academy, are nominated through a form, open to
all, on TechnologyReview.com, or through nomination by
an editor.
An important source of the latter nominations are the
editors of Technology Review’s editions in Germany, India,
China, Italy, and Spain: we want our list to be as interna-
tional as possible, because technological innovation is a
global enterprise, and because we are particularly inter-
ested in innovations that will solve persistent problems
in the developing and poor world. The nominees are
screened for appropriateness, and we collect curricula
vitae, personal statements, and at least three reference let-
ters. Simultaneously, we convene a panel of judges who
are experts in different technological fields and who may
be past TR35 winners themselves. We ask each judge to
assess about 10 candidates. The editors consider the final
list, which may include several hundred names, weighing
the judges’ comments and seeking a mixture that rep-
resents current trends in emerging technology and the
diversity of innovation around the globe. The list is whit-
tled down until 35 innovators remain.
The whole process, as well as the editing of the stories
about the young innovators, is led by Stephen Cass, Tech-
nology Review’s knowledgeable, wise, and eloquent special-
projects editor, who writes in the introduction to the TR35
(p. 43), “We strive to identify those individuals who are tack-
ling problems in a way that is likely to benefit society and
business. ... We pay special attention to those solving some
of the most intractable and critical problems in the devel-
oping world.” He notes that this approach can lead to the
selection of a technologist who is developing new materi-
als for new devices—and also to rewarding an entrepreneur
who is creating new business models that will move tech-
nology from the laboratory to the marketplace.
12 from the editor
Sept10 EditorLetter.indd 12
Over the last decade, many of the young innovators
we’ve selected have gone on to be spectacularly success-
ful. Previous winners include Larry Page and Sergey Brin,
the cofounders of Google; Mark Zuckerberg, the
cofounder of Facebook; Helen Greiner, the cofounder of
iRobot; Jonathan Ive, the chief designer at Apple; Max
Levchin, the cofounder of PayPal and founder of Slide;
David Berry, who cofounded and funded (as a venture
capitalist at Flagship Ventures) the biofuel companies
LS9 and Joule; and MIT neuroscientist Ed Boyden, one
of the inventors of the emerging field of optogenetics,
which makes it possible to control neurons with light.
This year’s winners have created innovations over a wide
variety of fields, including biomedicine, energy, materials,
communications, and transport, as well as software, hard-
ware, social technologies, and the Web.
And as we do every year, we have selected for special
attention a Humanitarian of the Year (p. 44), the TR35
winner who we believe is most likely to improve the con-
dition of humanity. This year, the winner is David Kobia,
a Kenyan expatriate who designed the open-source Web
service Ushahidi (the name means “witness” in Swahili).
Ushahidi collects citizen reports and pinpoints them in
space and time on an interactive map so that election
fraud or ethnic violence can be more easily reported. It
also makes it possible for first responders to disasters to
react more rapidly and effectively. Since Kobia created the
service as a way to document the violence following the
disputed Kenyan presidential election of late 2007, Usha-
hidi has become central to coördinating the response to
crises around the world.
Although Kobia is especially concerned with the plight
of the world’s dispossessed and unfortunate, he shares
something with all the young innovators this year and
in the past: they inspire and expand our sense of what
is possible. The innovations of the TR35 allow human
beings to do something difficult that they were not able
to do before.
Please read this year’s list, and write to me and tell me
mar k o stow
what you think at jason.pontin@technologyreview.com.
—Jason Pontin
t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w s e p t e m b e r / o c t o b e r 2010
8/6/10 3:39 PM
 SPECIAL ADVERTISING SECTION

TwenTy-firsT-CenTury TraffiC TeCh

Imagine this: you set out to drive across town to meet a friend. Before you start, you pull up a map of the route on your car’s navigator.
Anticipating the traffic expected during the next twenty minutes and the approximate duration of the drive, your navigator suggests a
route that should be the least congested. You click to accept the route and follow it to your destination without incident.
Once you arrive, LED signs on the street point you toward blocks with available parking and alert you to the nearest recharging
photo courtesy of imago

station. Wasting no time circling the area, you slip into a free spot, plug your car into the post, lock up, and use your phone to pay
for two hours of parking and charging.
This scenario is not so far in the future. Spanish companies, which have achieved international prominence in traffic planning
and modeling, tolling, lighting and signage, and guidance systems, are harnessing the latest technological advances, working to cre-
ate this reality in cities around the world.

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Keeping iT all Moving
As urban populations continue to grow, traffic pressure on exist-
ing roads and highways increases, although many cities in western
countries have expanded their built environment nearly to the limits
of what is possible. City and national managers are also concerned
about pollution and global warming: urban traffic contributes up
to 40 percent of a city’s carbon dioxide emissions, and about 70
percent of other pollutants, such as nitric oxide.
In response, says Rafael Morán, Madrid’s associate director
of traffic and planning, “We first need to convince people to
use public transportation . . . . And then we have to facilitate
the movement of vehicles.”
Adds Pablo Barceló, COO of Barcelona-based Bitcarrier,
“The only alternative is optimization” of current roads, “to make
better use . . . of the infrastructure that we already have,” in
photo courtesy of cynthia graber
order to avoid increasing traffic and to reduce emissions from
idling. To accomplish this, Spain’s Traffic Authority, part of the
Ministry of the Interior, has invested significant funds in intel-
ligent transportation systems (ITS) over the past twenty years.
Communications and computing power are already altering the
way we drive. Cell phones and GPS navigators send out signals
that allow managers to monitor the volume and speed of cars
on the road. And the movements of buses, cars, and trucks are
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monitored in real time, with drivers alerted by their on-board
navigators and by roadside signs to the best routes to take to
avoid snarls. Systems like these, which employ the tools of the
high-tech economy to keep traffic flowing, are some of the latest
examples of ITS that are starting to enter the market.
In order to speed up city bus rides, Grupo Cegasa, headquar-
tered between Bilbao and Pamplona (specialists in providing
road signs called variable message signs and communications
among those signs, vehicles, and control centers) is develop-
ing a technology to give traffic preference to buses, control-
ling access in special dedicated lanes. A GPS onboard a bus
communicates its location to a central computer in a control
center, which relays that location to traffic lights. The system
monitors the occupancy of the dedicated lanes so when the
bus approaches a signal, the signal remains green long enough
to allow it to pass.
To manage the flow, traffic controllers, sitting by screens
that show a scattering of city roads, need access to real-time
information about the location and speed of vehicles all around
the city. One of the most significant changes that supports this
effort is the use of travelers as information producers, rather
than simply information consumers. “All the systems [in use,
such as mobile phones and GPS systems with Bluetooth con-
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nections] are generating huge amounts of information,” says
Francisco Cáceres, chief technology officer at Madrid’s Telvent.
And Bitcarrier is one of the first two companies in the world
to commercialize a product that picks up on these signals to
count vehicles on the road.
CounTing wiTh signals
Today, traffic counting is generally accomplished by using induc-
tive loops buried under the road, which register the magnetic
interference of cars passing over them; since this is expensive
and time-consuming to implement, few intersections can provide
this critical information. Though other technologies for continu-
ous traffic counting have been developed, they are too expensive
to be widely used.
Bitcarrier’s founders believed they could devise a method to
capture the public Bluetooth signals that emanate from con-
sumer products, each with an individual signature. “The signals
are public—you cannot track the person—but you can track
the device,” says Barceló.
To date, in most Western countries, about 30 percent of
cars and trucks—or their drivers—are equipped with a smart
phone or GPS system. The proprietary sensor that Bitcarrier
has developed can be hung from a traffic light or lamp post
and plugged into a socket with no additional infrastructure, and
it can pick up the signals from equipment that passes within
approximately 120 feet.
This equipment collects data about both the number of vehi-
cles on the road and their average speed, as the sensors can
monitor when specific signals pass multiple sensors. Wireless
transmission directs this information to a central computer,
where highway managers can use it to notify drivers about
congestion and driving times ahead. The system can also alert
operators immediately to traffic jams from accidents.
This idea was conceived four years ago, and for the past year
and a half Bitcarrier has been creating the device and testing its
accuracy. In February 2010, after an eight-month trial period,
the transportation concession Abertis Infraestructuras—which
operates toll roads in Spain and other countries—bought 150
units to monitor traffic on a major Spanish highway. Abertis
has already announced that it will purchase additional units
for other roads. The city of Zaragoza, in northern Spain, has
decided to blanket the city with these sensors to capture nearly
100 percent of city traffic flow information, and inquiries are
coming in from around the world.
phanToM TollBooTh sysTeMs
Traffic traditionally slows to a crawl at tollbooths. To counter this,
companies and cities have been using onboard tags that allow vehi-
cles to drive through without stopping. The advanced information
systems and systems integration company Tecsidel, which designs
and supplies tolling systems around the world, is one of the few
international companies that has moved beyond barrier-free tolls
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SPECIAL ADVERTISING SECTION
to create an open tolling system. In this system, implemented by
Tecsidel in Oslo and elsewhere in Norway, cars continue moving
at normal speed when approaching a toll; the toll scanner stretches
over the highway like a traffic signal. This can save fuel by prevent-
ing traffic jams, and the scanner can be installed rapidly without
major remodeling of the road.
As vehicles zoom underneath the apparatus, overhead cam-
eras pick up a vehicle’s image at speeds up to 120 mph (200
km/h). If the vehicle has a tag, like an EasyPass in the U.S.,
the user is charged automatically. Otherwise, the license plate’s
image is captured and deciphered by a software program that
then sends a charge to the driver.
“Everything is based on the quality of the pictures,” says
Gerald Pelle, Tecsidel’s marketing director. “It’s a mature tech-
nology, but there are still limitations: if there’s a lot of snow or
dirt, the license plate is not even readable by human eyes.” The
Tecsidel apparatus captures both front and rear plate images to
minimize such challenges.
Today there’s a trend in some places—Portugal, for one—to
equip cars at purchase with ID tags, similar to license plates, that
can facilitate country-wide free-flow toll systems. Madrid-based
Indra Sistemas, a world leader in information and communica-
tion technologies, with projects in more than 100 countries, will
introduce the first such automated toll system in Portugal, on a
stretch of highway that runs north to the Spanish border. Indra’s
payment platform can handle up to 1.5 million transactions a day.
Indra integrates technologies that are available on the market
into complete systems, marketing them throughout Spain and in
Europe, Asia, and the Americas. Indra manages ITS for nearly
2,500 miles of Spanish highways and controls toll lanes and pla-
zas in 15 countries. Leveraging their defense experience, Indra
engineers have developed a product that capitalizes on radar
technology from Spain’s Department of Defense to provide a
more advanced radar system for civilian roads.
Indra is one of a number of systems integrators (which include
major international companies such as Telvent and Sice) which
develop their own products in house while also integrating avail-
able technology to present a cities or regions with complete traf-
fic management. Telvent supplies intelligent systems that control
traffic at more than 9,000 intersections a day, and toll networks
that handle 1.5 million vehicles annually; its clients include the
New York State Department of Transportation and the Munici-
pal Corporation of Greater Mumbai.
Sice integrates complete highway solutions in Europe, Latin
America, and North America, and at times operates highway
road tolls as a concessionaire standing in for a public authority.
In Melbourne, Australia, “we’re capable of managing 8 million
transactions a day [in tolls],” says Angel Aguilar, Sice’s inter-
national director.
According to infrastructure director Vicente Sebastián of
Grupo Etra, which provides integration service to cities such as
Madrid, his company’s goal is “to optimize the hardware with the
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 SPECIAL ADVERTISING SECTION

virTual valeT perfeCTs parKing

Cities often frustrate drivers in search of parking; cars weave through city blocks, wasting time and burning gasoline. parking cars quickly
could improve mobility and help cities meet environmental goals of reducing carbon dioxide and pollution.
what if drivers could be directed to available spots immediately upon arrival at their destinations? parking efficiency possibilities have
inspired Barcelona-based parkhelp’s directors, who originally founded their company to focus on embedded electronics connected to
the internet. That work morphed into a successful project creating the parking guidance system for Madrid’s new ten-thousand-space
airport parking garage, one of the largest such systems in europe.
parkhelp engineers designed proprietary sensor holders, which use no screws, and built their own cables, eliminating most connections,
creating a system that can be easily and quickly snapped into place.
sensors communicate the occupancy status of each space on a given floor to an independent processor on that floor. The floor processors
communicate with each other and with a central computer. “when we finished, the result was the most complete project available on
the markets for airports and projects of this size,” says company cofounder alexis puig: the company has since won contracts for similar
projects in 22 countries.
in 2007, parkhelp decided to try to create something that did not yet exist. “we said, let’s see how our successful experience in parking
[garages] can translate into parking in the city,” said puig.
first, company engineers needed to identify the best sensor available, one that uses little battery power. They decided on a new technology that
operates by registering the earth’s natural magnetic field, then sensing when it’s disturbed by a huge amount of iron—a vehicle—in that field.
once alerted to the presence of a vehicle, the sensor sends the information to a control center. That computer aggregates the vehicle
information and automatically updates leD signs to alert drivers to available spaces.
in the future, this information will also be uploaded to a website, even directly to a car’s gps. “you’ll be able to program in to your
photo courtesy of parkhelp

gps, ‘i want to go to this area of the city,’ and when you get there, it’ll direct you to a parking spot,” predicts parkhelp cofounder
ignacio Maluquer.
a prototype system very like that has already been set up in lleida, a city of almost 40,000 just north of Barcelona, and will soon be available
in other spanish cities, including Malaga and Madrid. Cities around the world have expressed interest, in part due to the clear environmental
benefits. But beyond that, the return on investment for cities or companies that manage city parking happens quickly, say company directors,
because drivers pay for the parking time they occupy, the turnover is rapid, and infractions are easy to enforce.

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most efficient use of energy, at the least cost, and integrate” all computer processing speeds, coupled with the greater quantity
the elements of a complete system from different manufacturers. of real-time information now available on the details of traffic
In addition to integrating services, the company develops and flow, have allowed a revolution in modeling: TSS and its part-
manufactures the core computer systems they deploy. They’re ners have developed both small- and larger-scale Aimsun mod-
working on a novel means of communicating with the public: in els that can be used by city traffic managers to determine the
Madrid, they’ve designed a system whereby riders can send a text consequences of changes to traffic in real time, allowing them
message with the bus number and stop identifier, and immediately to make rapid decisions based on predictions from the models.
receive back a text with the arrival time of the approaching bus. For instance, an ambulance might need to reach the scene
of an accident, but that accident has already caused changes
preDiCTing TraffiC in traffic that are rippling outward. The models can provide
In an ideal world, traffic managers need to peer into the near and images of the possible ambulance routes and suggest which
distant future to evaluate traffic control options. How will a road will be the fastest.
closing affect vehicle flow, and what are the best routes for redi- In Madrid’s municipal traffic control center, the graphic simu-
recting cars and buses? When an event such as an accident occurs, lations hover on a screen, allowing the controller to visualize
what are the best diversion plans to facilitate movement? the consequences of particular choices 10 to 20 times faster
Tekia Ingenieros (Tekia), based in Madrid, has been tackling than they would occur in the real world. The Aimsun software
the planning for traffic control in tunnels. The company’s most used here is used to model traffic for other cities in 60 coun-
ambitious project to date involved analyzing the safety needs of tries, including the entire nation of Singapore.
the newly built tunnel section of one of Madrid’s ring roads; it Telvent uses a modeling program for its control systems, and
is buried under a river, and the tunnels stretch out for more than has been able to incorporate weather and pavement conditions
30 miles (50 km), making it the world’s longest underground into the traffic management systems for cities such as Alberta,
automobile traffic structure. Canada. “We can use weather information for precise support.
Tekia engineers looked hard at potential safety threats to the For instance, we can predict what the pavement conditions will
tunnel, such as heavy traffic, or accidents, fires, or explosions. be over the coming hours,” says Cáceres.
They brought together a roundtable of security experts for a
year. Using all the expert information and possible scenarios
gleaned as part of their program, and aiming for the best out-
sMarT inforMaTion for
comes for each scenario, Tekia then built an expert operating sMarTer Travelers
system to help a city planner decide in real time which solutions Drivers today can take a quick glance at a number of web pages that
would best solve problems that arise. claim to show current traffic conditions. “We believe this informa-
Such traffic modeling software is the specialty of Trans- tion is inferior—or in some cases useless,” points out Gerodimos.
portation Simulations Systems (TSS), a Barcelona-based traffic “It’s often based on what we know now.” But if the information is
modeling company offering more than 25 years of experience not available, because a particular road isn’t monitored for traffic, it
helping cities plan for traffic flow. appears traffic-free, no matter what the actual conditions. A model
TSS developed its modeling program, Aimsun, using research can solve that issue, he explains, by extrapolating for the entire city.
performed at a Barcelona university. At the time, in the 1980s, com- And the second problem, he says, is that the driver hasn’t left
pany founders realized that the big-picture regional models that the house yet, and traffic may change rapidly. Gerodimos envi-
were being used for strategic planning might be able to predict pop- sions a future in which predictive models will be available not
ulation and traffic growth on a large scale, but were not much help just to traffic control managers, but to consumers as well. With
in determining the best solutions for small-scale changes in traffic. software such as Aimsun running, the car’s GPS system could
Company engineers wanted to create a model that could not only offer current traffic conditions, but recommend the
examine behavior on the micro level. “What will happen if best course for a 30-minute drive based on future traffic patterns.
there’s road work on a major arterial that also has a tramway “If we provide consumers with smart information about
and lots of traffic? You can experiment with adjustments to options for mobility, we’ll improve both mobility and the effi-
make the situation more tolerable—maybe change the light set- ciency of the infrastructure,” explains Telvent’s Cáceres.
tings, restrict access to some roads, or send the police out to Supplying easily accessed information is the goal of the system
direct traffic,” says Alex Gerodimos, TSS commercial director. designed by Telvent for New York City, San Diego, and Tennes-
Despite the much lower computing power available at the time, see. It relays real-time information on traffic and public trans-
TSS’s new models were able to accurately predict the results of portation via the Internet. Citizens can also dial 511 to listen to
interventions on this more modest scale. up-to-the-minute responses provided by a computer-generated
But while this was helpful for planning, these models could interactive voice response system.
not yet assist real-time traffic management. Since then, leaps in Today, many consumers receive information about traffic

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when they’re in the midst of it, on the road, through brightly
lit displays called variable message signs. These signs—typically
LEDs —look simple, says CEO Tony Batlló at Imago Screens,
one of the top LED sign manufacturers in the world for traffic
and for events such as sports. “In reality, the needs for traffic
[as opposed to sporting event screens] are much higher,” he
continues. “They need 100 percent security, functionality, and
performance, 24 hours a day. The reliability is crucial.”
The LEDs themselves form the base of the signs, and com-
pany engineers then carefully design the optics and the con-
trol systems to specific brightness, contrast, and luminosity,
depending on the sun conditions in a given country, and even
on a given day. “It’s important to be able to see the sign clearly,”
says Batlló. “But if it’s too bright, then it hurts your eyes and
you can’t read it.” Sensors built into the screens detect the light
conditions and modify their brightness automatically.
The sensors on the LED panels can offer additional informa-
tion to road managers. “The panel can be programmed to tell
the controller, ‘It’s raining; do you want to display a message
about rain?’ The operator can say yes or no,” explains Batlló.
“In the future, roads will have devices that can communicate
with each other in a kind of network, with cameras, sensors,
weather stations, and a network of information that will include
even the user’s vehicle on the road.”
new ways To naB BaD Drivers
As recently as 2005, Spain had one of the highest numbers of
accidents per person in western Europe. Through the use of new
technologies, the country managed to reduce deaths dramatically:
“We’ve gone down by more than half in less than five years,” says
Alberto Arbaiza, in charge of ITS projects at the Ministry of Inte-
rior’s Traffic Authority.
In speed management, standard techniques until now have
relied on fixed locations, either a cop with speed-catching radar
or a signpost that flashes a driver’s speed as he drives by. The
challenges presented by these fixed positions is that it’s relatively
easy for a passerby to slam on the brakes and then immediately
hit the accelerator.
To replace them, Grupo Cegasa has developed a system of
what’s known as section speed. This technique works by capturing
a car’s position first at one location, then at a second one down
the road, then calculating the speed that it took to traverse that
segment. The license plate numbers of speeders are captured
and sent to the authorities. “This is not only an alternative
way to measure speed, but it’s also safer, and more fair,” says
Alfonso Vazquez, international sales director, and it slows the
overall speed of the traffic.
Traffic accidents are also caused by drivers hurtling through
photo courtesy of
red lights. Today, the latest technology at intersections involves
an inductive loop under the street; as the light turns red, a car
passing over the loop triggers cameras that capture the car’s
image. Barcelona-based Quercus Technologies recently unveiled
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the first system in the world that operates on a small moveable
system of cameras, which works independently from traffic
lights or traffic controllers.
Quercus has built on its experience in artificial vision—
they’re one of the top producers in the world of license-plate
recognition systems—to create a noninvasive technology. “It’s
what we call virtual loop technology,” says Silvia Vilanova,
Quercus marketing director. “All the recognition you need is
in the camera and you don’t need any sensors in the road.”
The camera faces the light and picks up on the location of
light emanating from the signal. When the light changes from
green to red, the position of that light changes, and it triggers
the camera, which snaps a series of shots as the car traverses
the intersection. This product, launched in March 2010, has a
number of added advantages: it is significantly cheaper than
the alternative, and it demands no additional street work. In
addition, research has shown that after the implementation of
a system to capture transgressors at a light, that particular inter-
section becomes safer within a year or two. But the traditional
loop-based infrastructure is prohibitively expensive to move.
Quercus’s camera, however, can be readily lifted and recalibrated
to the specifications of a new intersection.
helping TransiT see green
To help transit systems communicate with public transportation
users, Tekia engineers developed a system of predicting bus arrival
times based on on-board GPS systems. They soon realized that the
equipment could be enhanced to contain more than just a GPS unit,
and could provide information beyond location. This information
could reduce a driver’s fuel consumption and thus her emissions.
The Tekia system contains a small computer that monitors
the driver’s speed and acceleration, immediately comparing
these against an optimal model to encourage the driver to use
the smallest possible amount of fuel, such as slower accelera-
tion. The system is now being tested in Madrid.
“When we present this to bus operators, they’re very inter-
ested; they see that it can be translated directly into cost savings,”
says Alejandro Sanchez, business development manager. The
company estimates that the systems can pay for themselves in
fuel savings in about three to four years.
Indra offers a system for making environmental measure-
ments—of carbon dioxide and other city pollutants such as
nitric oxide— in real time and sending that information to traf-
fic managers “so that they can see if, for instance, the center
of Madrid is overwhelmed with pollution, and they can make
the decision to reroute traffic,” says Mario Hornero, manager
of Indra traffic projects in Latin America.
These environmental advances, however, are incremental
steps designed to fine-tune the current transportation system.
Many companies are designing complete transformations of
the way we move and power our vehicles.
Grupo Cegasa, in a partnership led by MIT, is taking part in
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rethinking urban transportation. That MIT team has designed
a two-person stackable electric city car, designed to be picked
up and dropped off at locations around a city. Cegasa has more
than 25 years experience in developing batteries—it’s one of
the top battery manufacturers in Spain—and it is researching
the battery and storage systems for these new vehicles. Cegasa
is also partnering with a Spanish team, which includes the auto-
mobile manufacturer SEAT, to develop the next generation of
lithium batteries for SEAT’s coming electric car.
All major car manufacturers are now unrolling electric vehi-
cle models, but the infrastructure does not yet exist to support
those cars. Where will owners charge their cars? How will the
charging stations operate?
Circontrol, located outside Barcelona, began designing charg-
ing-station solutions more than three years ago, when electric
vehicles were still considered cars of the future. Company presi-
dent Ramon Cornellas decided to invest research funds in devel-
oping charging stations. Admits Moisés Barea, Circontrol’s export
manager, “The first time I heard this, I thought it was a little crazy,
because there were no electric vehicles yet.” Because of Cor-
nellas’s foresight, however, Circontrol is now one of only three
companies that is actually shipping charging stations to around
the world to cities that are piloting electric vehicle programs.
Circontrol is part of the Circutor group, which works in the
field of energy efficiency. In 2002, Circontrol designed its first
parking-guidance system, a combination of ultrasound sen-
sors in each garage space, signal lights to alert drivers to the
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Spain_traffic_final.indd 7
SPECIAL ADVERTISING SECTION
availability of a given parking spot, and LED signs to direct
drivers through the garage. From the beginning, Circontrol’s
focus, leveraging its parent company’s experience, was directed
towards energy efficiency and savings. Circontrol quickly began
to supply parking guidance to locations that include Turkey,
Chile, and the Philadelphia airport.
As engineers focused on whole-garage energy systems, they
realized that these locations will be prime spots for recharging
electric vehicles, and began to turn research in that direction.
There are, however, a number of issues. First, there’s as yet no
standard for how cars will be charged, and whether they should
operate off conventional plugs or use a larger charge, which would
operate more quickly but demand different engineering. Engineers
also found that if too many cars plug into the same source, they
cause interference in the grid. They were able to solve these prob-
lems by creating a base model that can be modified depending on
the types of car and plugs a manufacturer chooses.
But there are additional challenges that result from an entirely
new mode of driving. How do you charge customers? “This is
not just a socket—it’s not something on the street where every-
photo courtesy of circontrol
one can go and charge fuel for free,” says Barea. So Circontrol
created stations that must be activated, with either a credit card
or a radio frequency identity tag that identifies the customer
and can be charged to a linked account.
Security is also an issue. How do you prevent someone from
unplugging a car, and then plugging in his own car on someone
else’s account? Circontrol built in a number of safeguards: in
S7
8/5/2010 12:36:40 PM
 SPECIAL ADVERTISING SECTION

one, the charging station sends a small electrical charge out, which the car
returns in a closed loop. If someone unplugs a car, that small charge drops, Resources
and so the larger charge turns off as well. They’ve also designed a metal ICEX (Spanish Institute for Foreign Trade)
“hat” that locks down over the plug after payment. www.spainbusiness.com
The company has already shipped more than 300 units to pilot programs www.spaintechnology.com

across Europe. Electric cars, or plug-in hybrid electric vehicles, are now com- AMEC URBIS
www.amec.es
ing on line so quickly, says Barea, that “the challenge is to be ready with all
AYUNTAMIENTO DE MADRID
our operations and logistics, with the stock ready to manufacture.” www.munimadrid.es
BIT CARRIER
In Search of ParkIng www.bitcarrier.com
Parking guidance systems have been gaining ground in parking garages around CEGASA
www.cegasa.com
the world. The Parkare group provides guidance systems for more than fifty
thousand parking spaces, along with license plate recognition hardware and soft- CIRCONTROL
www.circontrol.com
ware, and has sold more than twenty thousand of the on-street parking meters
DGT
known as pay-and-display, which replace traditional meters with a fee boxes that www.dgt.es
sell tickets to be displayed in car windows. GRUPO ETRA
Parkare is investigating the best ways to use the latest technologies to facili- www.grupoetra.com
tate parking. “If you’re booking a ticket on line for a movie, we can add another IMAGO SCREENS
www.imagoscreens.com
button to book your car space. So you can go to the movie and know that
INDRA
you have a spot reserved in the garage,” says Francisco Martin, international www.indra.es
division director of Parkare.
MINISTERIO DE FOMENTO
The most efficient system to charge drivers and manage traffic in a city www.fomento.es
challenged the owners of Barcelona-based Open Traffic Systems to develop OPEN TRAFFIC
an entirely new on-street parking method, which they refer to as a “com- www.opentraffic.net
plete parking solution.” PARKARE
www.parkaregroup.com
The centerpiece of the design is a payment kiosk, which not only accepts
PARKHELP
payment for the parking space, but displays an entire computer screen to man- www.parkhelp.com
age the interaction. The user types in her license plate number, pays for park- QUERCUS TECHNOLOGIES
ing time, and gains access to information on bus routes and local businesses. www.quercus.biz
The license plate information is then sent to a central server, which broad- SICE
casts the data to the ticketing authorities monitoring the streets with hand- www.sice.com

held PDAs. Open Traffic Systems also provides a system for the authorities TECSIDEL
www.tecsidel.es
to use while driving around and checking the license plates: two cameras
TEKIA
mounted on a car scan the streets and can read the plates, matching plate www.tekia.es
numbers against ones in the system. This technology was unveiled in a 500- TELVENT
unit system around the northern city of Bilbao, and is now being sold else- www.telvent.com
where in Europe and North America. TSS
The technology demands a greater upfront investment than traditional park- www.aimsun.com

ing meters, according to Clint Burnette, Open Traffic Systems project manager, For a complete company listing and to find out
“but you need fewer enforcement agents, and they take less time [to figure out more about New Technologies in Spain, visit:
who deserves a fine].” www.technologyreview.com/spain/
In the latest upgrade, geared towards environmental sustainability, the
For more information visit:
system can run off solar power. It also includes Circontrol’s electric car www.us.spainbusiness.com
charging stations as a payment option, and offers rugged, gear-free bikes
(to avoid damage common to city rental bicycles) that can be paid for at the Contact:
Trade Commission of Spain in Chicago
kiosk and deposited at other sites around a given city. One such pilot system 500 N. Michigan Ave., Suite 1500
has been installed in the north of Barcelona. Chicago, IL 60611, USA
Even at a time of economic challenges, cities envision these systems
photo courtesy of

T: 312 644 1154

as potential revenue sources that will yield a good return on investment, F: 312 527 5531
chicago@mcx.es
adds Burnette: “We’ve hired new people for the last six months, and we
have so much work we’ll have to hire more.”

S8 w w w . t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w . c o m / s p a i n / t r a f f i c

Spain_traffic_final.indd 8 8/5/2010 4:29:10 PM

 to market

t r a n s p o r tat i o n

a charger
For the
smart grid
The neW ge charging station for
electric cars will fully charge a battery
in four to eight hours—much faster
than standard plug-in charging, which
can take 18 hours. it allows two-way
communication between stations and
power companies, so that the utilities
can minimize the vehicles’ demand on
the grid. ge hopes that municipalities
and green-building owners will install
the chargers in parking areas and that
electric-car owners will buy home ver-
sions for their garages.

W Product: WattStation Cost: $3,000 to $7,000

Availability: Now for commercial version; a residential
version costing $1,000 to $1,500 will be announced later
E R I K PAWAS SAR

in 2010 Source: www.ecomagination.com/wattstation

Company: GE

w w w . t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w . c o m to market 21

Sept10 To Market.indd 21 8/10/10 11:37 AM

 to market

r e n ewab l e
power

Low-cost
soLar
Solar cellS can produce 10 times
more electricity per gram of silicon
thanks to this system, which concen-
trates sunlight on the cells with the
help of parabolic troughs and a track-
ing system that keeps them pointed
at the sun. concentrated sunlight
ordinarily causes solar cells to over-
heat, impairing their performance, m at e r i a l s

but this system uses heat sinks and
convection to prevent that problem.
The reflective troughs, a type already
used in solar thermal plants that con-
centrate sunlight to make steam and
touch screen touch-up
When applied over glass displays, these transparent conducting films make
better touch screens for smart phones and tablet computers. They’re more
electrically conductive than the films used now, which means better touch

c o u rte sy o f s kyli n e s o lar (s o lar); c h r i sto p h e r harti n g (f i lm); c o u rte sy o f d na2.0 (g e n e)

drive turbines, can be made in high
volume at low prices.
W Product: high gain solar 1000 Cost: depends
on installation Availability: now
Source: www.skyline-solar.com
Company: skyline solar
response; they prevent electromagnetic interference from other parts of the
device, so you can run more applications at the same time; and they let more
light through, which means a brighter display.
W Product: 3m transparent conductors Cost: not available Availability: now Source: www..3m.com
Company: 3m

bioengineering

Designing Genes
Want a gene that can produce enzymes that efficiently turn organic materials
into biofuels? new software makes it easy to design genes from scratch, and
displays schematics (right). the company offering the software can produce the
sequence, or you can hand the task to another dna synthesis firm.

W Product: gene designer 2.0 Cost: free Availability: now Source: www.dna20.com/
genedesigner2 Company: dna2.0

22 to market t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w s e p t e m b e r / o c t o b e r 2010

Sept10 To Market.indd 22 8/10/10 11:37 AM

 to market

r o b ots

Boss on
wheeLs
remember the Segway? it
never quite revolutionized
transportation, but a similar
mobility technology now
underpins this telepresence
robot, called anybot. it
glides on two wheels around
an office or factory to let
workers videoconference
with the boss, who can con-
trol the contraption from
a remote keyboard. The
anybot is equipped with an
obstacle-sensing and guid-
ance system to avoid crash-
ing into things.

W Product: anybot
Cost: $15,000
Availability: november
Source: www.anybots.com
Company: anybots

m e dical devices

disposaBLe eeg
c h r i sto p h e r harti n g (e e g); c o u rte sy o f anyb ots (b o s s)

deTermining whether a convulsive emergency-room patient is having con-

tinuous epileptic seizures, not suffering from a different affliction, requires an
eeg. The test normally requires trained technicians to affix a special cap and is
not always performed. This disposable eeg array is so easy to use that medical
staff with no extra training can fit it to the scalp in about five minutes. The device
received U.S. Food and drug administration clearance this year; european
approval is expected later in 2010.

W Product: statnet Cost: $595 for a box of five Availability: now Source: www.hydrodot.net/products/statnet.html
Company: hydrodot

w w w . t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w . c o m to market 23

Sept10 To Market.indd 23 8/10/10 11:37 AM

 to market

neXt-gen gam es

pLaYtime,
reinVented
The latest games exploit 3-d
detectors, motion-capture tech-
nologies, and cloud services.

Into the Clouds

a subscription service makes it possible to play

Watch the Hand

graphics-intensive games without bulky consoles
or high-powered computers. games are streamed
over the internet to a pc, mac, or television through
a microconsole (above left). processing takes place the playstation controller uses a lighted globe at the end of a wand (two are shown
on remote servers, where the games are stored. above) to precisely place a character in three-dimensional space. a camera tracks the
ball to determine the position of the player’s hand; crucially, it uses the apparent size
of the ball to gauge depth. this allows precise placement of a character’s hand, which
W Product: onlive Cost: first year of membership is avail-
able free through labor day, $4.95 per month for second year is helpful when shooting things.
Availability: now Source: www.onlive.com
Company: onlive
W Product: playstation move motion controller Cost: $50 ($100 bundled with required
playstation eye camera; console sold separately) Availability: september 2010 Source:

c o u rte sy o f o n liVe (c lo u d); s o ny (han d); an d m i c r o s o ft (trac k e r)

us.playstation.com/ps3/playstation-move Company: sony

Body Tracker
using a video camera and a depth sensor to follow 48
points on your head, torso, arms, hands, and legs, this
device makes it possible to control game elements
entirely through body movements.

W Product: kinect for Xbox 360 Cost: $150 (console sold sepa-
rately) Availability: november 2010 Source: www.xbox.com/
en-us/kinect Company: microsoft

24 to market t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w s e p t e m b e r / o c t o b e r 2010

Sept10 To Market.indd 24 8/10/10 11:37 AM

 I CAN’T CONTROL EVERYTHING,
BUT I’M GETTING
DANGEROUSLY CLOSE.
You have teams spread all over the world. Keeping them all
on the same page takes a lot of coordination. With a unified
communication solution from Verizon, you can stay connected
to your teams regardless of their location. So while your
projects may be complex, your collaboration is anything but.

VERIZONWIRELESS.COM/TECHNOLOGY

Network details & coverage maps at vzw.com. © 2010 Verizon Wireless.

VERIZ_TR1010.indd 1 8/11/10 2:56 PM

VWR60790_Tech_Review_Tech_1page_v1b_rc.indd 1 8/10/10 2:40 PM
 to market

d iag n o sti c s

desktop
cancer
check
a device that analyzes blood
levels of prostate-specific anti-
gen (pSa) is one of the first
doctor’s-office uses of micro-
fluidics—technology that can
manipulate fluids on a chip at
microscopic scales. When a car-
tridge bearing a blood sample is
inserted into the tabletop device,
an accurate reading can be com-
pleted in 15 minutes, helping
monitor the health of patients
with prostate cancer. The pro-
cedure used now involves send-
ing a sample to a lab for analysis,
which often takes a day or two.
The device received european
approval in June.

W Product: claros dX 1 Cost: to be announced

in late 2010 Availability: late 2010 in selected
european markets Source: www.clarosdx.com
Company: claros

e n e r gy

CO2 Emissions
Monitor
stick this device between a wall socket
and any electronic equipment and it will
tell you how much electricity the gadget
uses, how much that electricity cost, and
how much carbon dioxide was emitted to
produce it. the monitor comes preloaded
with costs and emission levels that reflect
u.s. averages; users can also program it
with local rates.
c h r i sto p h e r harti n g

W Product: conserve insight energy use monitor

Cost: $29.99 Availability: now
Source: www.belkin.com/conserve/insight
Company: belkin

26 to market t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w s e p t e m b e r / o c t o b e r 2010

Sept10 To Market.indd 26 8/10/10 11:37 AM

 336 Volts of Green Engineering
MEASURE IT – FIX IT

Developing a commercially viable fuel cell vehicle has been a significant challenge because
of the considerable expense of designing and testing each new concept. With NI LabVIEW
graphical programming and NI CompactRIO hardware, Ford quickly prototyped fuel cell control
unit iterations, resulting in the world’s first fuel cell plug-in hybrid.

MEASURE IT FIX IT

Acquire Analyze Present Design Prototype Deploy

Acquire and Analyze and Present data Design optimized Prototype designs Deploy to the
measure data extract information with HMIs, Web control algorithms on ready-to-run hardware platform
from any sensor with signal interfaces, and systems hardware you choose
or signal processing and reports

Ford is just one of many customers using the NI graphical system design platform to improve the world around
them. Engineers and scientists in virtually every industry are creating new ways to measure and fix industrial
machines and processes so they can do their jobs better and more efficiently. And, along the way, they are
creating innovative solutions to address some of today’s most pressing environmental issues.

>> Download the Ford technical case study at ni.com/336 800 258 7018

©2009 National Instruments. All rights reserved. CompactRIO, LabVIEW, National Instruments, NI, and ni.com are trademarks of National Instruments.
Other product and company names listed are trademarks or trade names of their respective companies. 1122

Untitled-1 1 7/20/2010 4:49:56 PM

 GRAPHITI Energy grants
Authorized $26, 200
Awarded $23, 420
Spent* $4, 360 million

All $ figures in millions

WASHINGTON

Taking Stock of
Wind farms are expanding across
the state, and smart-grid projects
have been funded to bring the

the Stimulus
Washington power they generate to customers.
$937
N
THE TECHNOLOGY FUNDING IN LAST
YEAR’S RECOVERY ACT IS JUST Montana
BEGINNING TO REACH ITS TARGETS. $133

Idaho
$175

M
ost of the direct spending in the
$787 billion stimulus bill passed in Oregon
COLORADO Wyoming
Cities and counties will receive $87
February 2009 was targeted at infrastruc- $434
over $100 million in grants to fund
ture projects that could begin immediately weatherization and other energy-
and provide a quick injection of jobs into efficiency projects.
a reeling economy. But the legislation also
provided more than $50 billion in grants
to deploy energy and information tech-
nologies, and that money will take longer Nevada
Utah
$359
to spend. While the ultimate economic $585
Colorado
value of the investment is yet to be deter- $697
mined (see “Cash for Infrastructure,” p. 100),
California
the map at right shows that the money is $3,354
at last beginning to flow. The bar shows Arizona
how much money was authorized, how $689
CALIFORNIA New Mexico
much of it has been awarded to specific The center of renewable-energy $204
projects, and how much has been paid technology and production in the
out. While just $381 million of the $7.2 U.S. has won more energy funding
than any other state.
billion authorized to bring broadband to
rural areas had been spent as of June 30,
for example, nearly $2.5 billion has been
awarded, and the rest should be spoken Non-state-specific spending $11,144
for by September. The Department of
Energy, which controls $32.7 billion for Awarded
(outer ring) $6,322
clean energy, has also picked up the pace,
awarding hundreds of grants to projects
around the country. —Matt Mahoney HOW TO READ
Spent*
(inner ring) SECTORS STATE BUDGETS
■ Energy $1,500
Information graphic by
TO M M Y M C C A LL ■ Science 1,000
$103 ■ Smart grid 500
Sources: Funding reported by government agencies as of June
30, 2010, at www.recovery.gov. Individual state totals do not $4,016 ■ Broadband 100
include funds secured through loan guarantees. 10
■ Health-care IT
*Does not include $17.6 billion in Medicare incentive payments
$362 $341 5
to health-care providers.

28 GRAPHITI T E CH N O L O G Y R E V I E W S E P T E M B E R / O C T O B E R 2010

Sept10 Graphiti.indd 28 8/11/10 2:28 PM

 TOTAL SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY GRANT AUTHORIZATIONS

$57,900 million
Health-
Smart grid Science Broadband care IT
$4, 500 $18, 000 $7, 200 $2, 000
$4, 305 $14, 865 $2, 455 $1, 659
$118 $3, 783 $381 $18

MICHIGAN MASSACHUSETTS
Roughly half of the PENNSYLVANIA Has grabbed an outsize
$2.4 billion in grants for Received the highest share of share of the billions in new
advanced battery manufac- broadband funds for bringing science funding from federal
turing will be spent here. high-speed Internet access to agencies.
underserved areas.
North Dakota Maine
$102 $338
New York Vermont NH
$2,177 $225 $215
Minnesota
$537
South Dakota Pennsylvania
$122 Wisconsin $1,839
$855
Michigan
$1,783

Iowa
$175 Ohio
Nebraska $1,091 Conn. RI Massachusetts
$190 $337 $157 $1,644
NJ $552
Kansas Illinois Indiana Delaware $190
$300 $1,219 $912 W.Va.
$639 Maryland $797

Missouri Kentucky
$609 $361 Virginia $634 Washington, DC $706

Oklahoma Tennessee
$604 North Carolina
$427 $1,276

South Carolina NORTH CAROLINA

Arkansas Alabama Georgia $309 Will receive nearly half a billion
$189 $526 $672 dollars in grants to fund storage
technology for wind power and a
smart-grid demonstration project.
Texas
$2,089 Louisiana Mississippi
$431 $286

FLORIDA
Puerto Rico $214
Utility FPL was awarded
$200 million for a smart-grid
project in Miami last fall, but its Florida
CEO recently complained that $1,335 Alaska
TEXAS $365 Hawaii $164
he had yet to see any money.
A project on the Gulf of Mexico has
been awarded over $250 million to
capture and sequester a million tons
of industrial carbon dioxide per year.

W W W . T E CH N O L O G Y R E V I E W . C O M GRAPHITI 29

Sept10 Graphiti.indd 29 8/9/10 11:33 AM

 Q&a
bill gates
“Is that what we have in mind: to delay Armageddon for three years?”
W hen Bill Gates is interested in
something new, his organizing,
capacious intelligence learns everything
about it, and he imagines ways it could be
better. Now the cofounder of Microsoft
and the Bill and Melinda Gates Founda-
tion is interested in energy. At his offices
in Kirkland, WA, he spoke to Jason
Pontin, Technology Review’s editor in
chief. Gates called for energy “miracles”
and a more rational energy policy, and he
explained how being a software “fanatic”
prepared him to invest in new ideas.
TR: The Gates Foundation has invested in
solutions to big problems like infectious
diseases in poor countries. Providing clean
energy for the nine billion people the
planet will hold in 2050 is a problem that’s
civilizational in scale. What can philanthro-
py contribute to energy research?
Gates: Well, basically not much. The
energy market is an absolutely gigantic
market, big enough that if you can come
up with cheap ways of making electricity,
then that should be done with typical big-
firm risk taking, small-firm risk taking.
On the other hand, the way capitalism
works is that it systemically underfunds
innovation, because the innovators can’t
capture the full benefits [of their innova-
tions]. But there’s a net benefit to society
being more R&D-oriented. And that’s
why in health research, governments do
fund R&D.
You are a member of the American
Energy Innovation Council, which calls
for a national energy policy that would
increase U.S. investment in energy
research every year from $5 billion to
$16 billion. I was stunned that the U.S.
government invests so little.
I was stunned myself. The National
Institutes of Health invest a bit more
than $30 billion.
30 q &a
Sept10 Q&A.indd 30
So why couldn’t huge, regular, depend-
able investments from your foundation
make a difference?
We might have some involvement
where it’s connected to things that
wouldn’t happen for poor people other-
wise. so there may be some particular
biomass approaches for getting local
energy out where there’s no roads and
infrastructure, where there wouldn’t be a
market signal for that type of innovation.
But [as an investor] I’ve put my money
into Vinod Khosla’s venture fund. I’ve
put money into Nathan Myhrvold [and
his Intellectual Ventures fund]. Nathan
has this thing that invents ideas broadly,
many of which are energy-related. some
of those energy-related things will result
in startups. One has so far: this amazing,
wild nuclear [reactor design], TerraPower.
If energy research is underfunded by $11
billion, what is a better approach to
funding new energy technologies?
It’s not a problem that lends itself to a
Manhattan Project–type approach. It has
to be low cost and usable in different cir-
cumstances. You can’t just get a bunch of
smart people together and know which
path they should go off and pursue. Actu-
ally, it’s amazing that that worked for the
Manhattan Project.
It worked because it had a very specific
end: they wanted to build the biggest
bomb in the world and end the war.
They knew what they wanted to do. I
guess in a vague sense we can say that
we want energy that costs, say, a quarter
of what coal electricity does and emits
zero CO2. We can write that down. But
there are many paths to get there, each
of which a realist would look at and say,
“Wow, there’s a lot of difficult things along
that path.” so I think it’s very important,
both to give poor people cheap energy
and to avoid hugely negative climate
change, that the u.s. and other govern-
ments fund basic research. The irony is
that if you actually look at the amount of
money that’s been spent on feed-in tariffs
and you properly account for it—tax cred-
its, feed-in credits in spain, solar photo-
voltaic stuff in Germany—the world has
spent a massive amount of money which
would have been far better spent on
energy research.
Let’s talk about policy, then. The
prospects for a strong climate bill in the
U.S. Congress now look dim. So do the
chances for any binding international
treaty. But almost everyone agrees that
there needs to be a price on carbon
or a tax.
No, that’s not right. It’s ideal to have
a carbon tax, not just a price on carbon,
which is this fuzzy word that includes
cap-and-trade. You’re using the tax to
create a mode shift to a different form
of energy generation. And then you just
take all the carbon-emitting plants, you
look at their lifetime, and you say on a
certain date this one has to be shut down
and when a new one is put in place, it has
to be low-CO2-emitting.
That’s a regulatory approach, and it’s
very clear. Innovators are designing
things for the power-plant buyers 10 years
from now, who are looking at the regula-
tory and tax environment for the next
40 years. If you said to a utility company
executive, which is more likely to stay
in place: a cap-and-trade thing, whose
price will vary all over the map, that will
have some international things that will
be shown to be a waste of money? Or a
tax and a regulatory framework for plant
replacement over the next 50 years? We
should have a carbon tax. What we owe
the developing world is this: we’re willing
to pay high prices for energy plants above
coal and drive prices down the curve so by
the time they need to buy them, they don’t
have to pay the high price.
Photograph by BRAD sWONe T z / Re Du x
8/10/10 5:59 PM
 w w w . t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w . c o m q &a 31

Sept10 Q&A.indd 31 8/9/10 3:48 PM

 Q&a
That sounds politically unlikely.
Which is more likely: a carbon tax
with all sorts of markets and options and
uncertainties about prices, and traders
in the middle, and confusion about who
initially gets the most advantage? Or a
regulatory thing and a 2 percent tax to
fund the R&D so that utilities know they
can buy a plant that’s emitting hardly any
CO2? Raising energy prices by 2 percent
and sending it to R&D activities seems
easier in a weak economy than raising
them 20 percent. Now, 0 percent is the
easiest option of them all, but unfortu-
nately, that doesn’t get us the solution to
this problem.
You’re saying that meeting our energy
needs will be both highly complicated
and fraught with unknown problems.
It is disappointing that some people
have painted this problem as easy to
solve. It’s not easy, and it’s bad for society
if we think it is, because then funding for
R&D doesn’t happen.
You’ve talked about the need for “energy
miracles.” But we’ve been waiting for such
breakthroughs for decades. TerraPower is
a traveling-wave reactor, a design that
dates back to the 1950s.
Well, no, we haven’t been working on
those things. The nuclear industry was
effectively shut down in the late ’70s.
And so evolutionary improvements on
those so-called Gen 3 designs really
didn’t happen, and more radical things
didn’t happen.
But let me get back to the main thrust
of your question. The CO2 problem is
simple. Any amount you emit causes
warming, because there’s about a 20 per-
cent fraction that stays for over 10,000
years. so the problem is to get essentially
to zero CO2 emissions. And that’s a very
hard problem, because you have sources
like agriculture, rice, cows, and small
sources out with the poorest people. so
you better get the big sources: you better
get rich-world transportation, rich-world
electricity, and so on to get anywhere
32 q &a
Sept10 Q&A.indd 32
near your goal. If x or Y or z gets you a
20 percent reduction in CO2, then you’ve
just got the planet, what, another three
years? Congratulations! I mean, is that
what we have in mind: to delay Armaged-
don for three years? Is that really it?
The u.s. uses, per person, over twice as
much energy as most other rich coun-
tries. And so it’s easy to say we should
cut energy use through better buildings
and higher MPG and all sorts of things.
But even in the most optimistic case, if
the u.s. is cutting its energy intensity
by a factor of two, to get to european or
Japanese levels, the amount of increased
energy needed by poor people during
that time frame will mean that there’s
never going to be a year where the world
uses less energy. The only hope is less
CO2 per unit of energy. And no: there is
no existing technology that at anywhere
near economic levels gives us electricity
with zero CO2.
Then what kinds of energy miracles do
we need?
Almost everything called renewable
energy is intermittent. I have another
term for it: “energy farming.” In fact, you
need not just a storage miracle, you need
a transmission miracle, because intermit-
tent sources are not available in an effi-
cient form in all locations. Now, energy
factories, which are hydrocarbon and
nuclear energy—those things are nice.
You can put a roof on them if you get
bad weather. But energy farming? Good
luck to you! unfortunately, conventional
energy factories emit CO2 and that is a
very tough problem to solve, and there’s a
huge disincentive to do research on it.
You’ve said that nuclear energy has the
best chance of being an energy miracle.
Well, it’s the one I’ve gotten involved in.
I spend time at TerraPower. I don’t claim
to be the person who’s surveyed all the
possibilities. I think solar thermal has a
lot of promise. solar chemical: some peo-
ple see the possibilities at the research
level. Algae: I’ve actually got some money
in some of those [ventures]. Then there
are crazy things like these high-wind kite
guys. You really don’t want to rule any-
thing out.
Will TerraPower really build a traveling-
wave reactor? And if so, where?
We’re in discussions with basically
everybody. TerraPower itself will not raise
the money to build the reactor. We will
partner with some mix of sovereign and
private actors to get TP1, which is what
we call our first reactor, and our dream is
to build that by 2020. It’s more likely to
be built in Asia than in North America or
europe. China’s the obvious one.
TerraPower is far out.
It’s very far out. It definitely needs to
be categorized as a high-risk, wild thing,
but the world only needs a few wild
things to succeed. But you’ve got to get
the pilot plant built, which is hard. You’ve
got to have all the science and economics
work the way they work on paper.
How has being a philanthropist broad-
ened you in a way that your career as a
software entrepreneur did not?
Believe me, when somebody’s in their
entrepreneurial mode—being fanatical,
inventing new things—the value they’re
adding to the world is phenomenal. If
they invent new technologies, that is an
amazing thing. And they don’t even have
to know how it’s going to help people. But
it will: in education, medical research,
you name it. so I was one of those fanat-
ics in my 20s where I didn’t know about
poor people. I worked night and day on
software. I thought a lot about software.
That’s a great mode to be in, but in my 30s
I got exposure to management, although
I was still writing some of the code. Then
in my 40s, the majority of what I was
doing was large-organization manage-
ment and picking strategies, but I didn’t
write any code that shipped in products.
Now, in my 50s, I’m in a role that’s kind of
like that.
t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w s e p t e m b e r / o c t o b e r 2010
8/9/10 3:48 PM
 Tomorrow’s business tools
at your fingertips.

Visit Technology Review’s

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Special Report to learn
about the technologies
that will power the office
of tomorrow.

www.technologyreview.com/ootf

Sponsored By

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8/4/2010 2:24 PM
AM
 p h oto e s say

living Data
Researchers pushing the furthest boundaries of science
and technology can spend a lot of time contemplat-
ing the intangible. The AlloSphere, a three-story-high
globe that facilitates interactive 3-D visualizations
of data, is designed to help. Located at the California
NanoSystems Institute at the University of California,
Santa Barbara, the facility enables scientists to dive into
data in unprecedented ways. Inside the sphere, they
can get their hands on the atoms making up the crys-
tal structure of new solar-cell materials or enter a brain
and hear its activity.
By Tom SIm o N I T e Photographs by jA So N m A DA R A

34 photo ess ay t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w s e p t e m b e r / o c t o b e r 2010

Sept10 Photo Essay.indd 34 8/6/10 4:31 PM

 Standing on a bridge sus-
pended across the sphere’s
center, a visitor contem-
plates a visualization of the
quantum wave function of
a hydrogen atom’s elec-
tron. When viewed through
3-D glasses, the model
appears to hang in the air.

w w w . t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w . c o m photo ess ay 35

Sept10 Photo Essay.indd 35 8/11/10 11:51 AM

 36 photo ess ay t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w s e p t e m b e r / o c t o b e r 2010

Sept10 Photo Essay.indd 36 8/6/10 4:31 PM

 To completely immerse view-
ers, the AlloSphere projects
visualizations of data onto the
inside of two hemispheres five
meters in radius (left). Viewers
are suspended inside on the
bridge (bottom right). “It’s like
being in a 30-person-capacity
submarine and looking out
as you move through the
data,” says JoAnn Kuchera-
Morin, the facility’s director.
The sphere itself, made of
perforated aluminum, sits
inside a room lined with
sound-absorbing material
w w w . t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w . c o m
Sept10 Photo Essay.indd 37
(top right) to help 16 speakers
deliver clear sound to people
inside. Projectors beneath
the bridge cover one side of
the sphere with imagery; a
recent upgrade increased
the number from two to six,
which can light up a broad
360° band that surrounds
the viewer completely. The
number of speakers is being
bumped up to 128, making it
possible to create soundscapes
that fool the senses: sounds
can seem to emanate from
any point inside the sphere.
photo ess ay 37
8/11/10 11:51 AM
 One data set being explored
is a functional magnetic reso-
nance imaging (fMRI) scan
that records the activity of a
brain. Navigating through the
virtual 3-D space provides a
novel way for neuroscientists
to look at the activity in dif-
ferent parts of the brain dur-
ing thought processes. The
sequence of images at near
right was taken from top to
bottom as a user moved from
the outside of the brain to
deep inside. The interior of the
brain (far right) surrounds the
viewer as a vast and complex
cavern, echoing with regular
sounds like electronic water
droplets. The colored blocks
are anatomical signposts;
the pitch of the droplet-like
sounds correlates with the
blood density at each location,
a proxy for neural activity.

38 photo ess ay

Sept10 Photo Essay.indd 38 8/11/10 11:51 AM

 w w w . t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w . c o m photo ess ay 39

Sept10 Photo Essay.indd 39 8/6/10 4:32 PM

 40 photo ess ay t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w s e p t e m b e r / o c t o b e r 2010

Sept10 Photo Essay.indd 40 8/6/10 4:32 PM

 Watch a video of the AlloSphere in
www action: technologyreview.com/
photoessay

At left, computer engineer

Dennis Adderton demon-
strates gloves studded with
infrared LEDs that are vis-
ible to 14 infrared cameras.
The gloves allow users to
manipulate the images using
hand gestures. At right are
two views of a model of a
zinc-based solar-cell mate-
rial. The colored stream-
ers show how electrostatic
charge density varies across
a hydrogen bond; the blue
and red bubbles are zinc and
oxygen atoms, respectively.
The same information is also
translated into sound. Materi-
als scientists have reported
being able to identify bond-
ing nodes more successfully
with their ears than with their
eyes, says Kuchera-Morin.
The AlloSphere’s simula-
tions could at some point be
used to perform live chemis-
try simulations, thanks to a
planned high-speed connec-
tion to the National Center
for Supercomputing Applica-
tions at the University of Illi-
nois at Urbana-Champaign.

w w w . t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w . c o m photo ess ay 41

Sept10 Photo Essay.indd 41 8/11/10 11:51 AM

ALCAT_TR1010.indd 1 8/11/10 2:36 PM
 35
35 innovators under 35

Who Will be the next

helen Greiner, Mark
ZuckerberG, larry
PaGe, evan WilliaMs,
Jonathan ive, Marc
andreessen, daniel
schraG, serGey brin,
Max levchin? ■ internet
david kobia .....................44
Humanitarian of the Year
danah boyd .....................48
■ software
rikin Gandhi ...................64
kim hazelwood ...........68
indrani Medhi ..................74
Wesley chan ...................56 andrey rybalchenko .70
Each year, Technology Review selects 35 innovators under the age nick Feamster ...............55 Jian sun ...............................62
of 35 who we believe are transforming technology. We solicit can- david karp .........................51 richard tibbetts ..........58
didates from around the world, looking for the best people from christopher ■ transportation
kruegel .................................63
industry and academia. Helped by a panel of expert judges, we kati london .....................60
Jochen Mundinger ....69
strive to identify those individuals who are tackling problems in avi Muchnick...................54 ■ hardware
aaron dollar.....................52
a way that is likely to benefit society and business. This can mean, ■ biotechnology t. scott saponas .........49
say, developing new materials for solar cells, but it can also mean Jacob hanna ...................68
■ materials
Philip low ...........................71
creating new business models to commercialize technologies timothy lu ........................62 alán aspuru-Guzik ... 72
more efficiently. We pay special attention to those solving some celeste nelson.............52 conor Madigan..............74
Mikhail shapiro ............58 Michael Mcalpine ......50
of the most intractable and critical problems in the developing samuel sia .......................59 Michelle Povinelli .......60
world. Our Humanitarian of the Year, for example, shows how ■ energy ■ telecom­
software and new crowdsourcing techniques can come to people’s david bradwell ..............67 munications
ranveer chandra ....... 72
aid in their times of greatest need. In getting to know the 2010 hany eitouni ...................56
Gabriel charlet .............66
Peter Meinhold .............70
TR35, we have been impressed and inspired by their talent and lyndon rive .....................64 amir alexander
vision; we hope you are too. —The Editors chris rivest......................55 hasson ..................................51

w w w . t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w . c o m tr 35 43

Sept10 TR35 Intro.indd 43 8/11/10 9:37 AM

 35
35
i nte r n et
Humanitarian of the Year
David Kobia, 32
Software that helps populations cope with crises
Ushahidi
T
he Ushahidi project brings crowd­
sourcing to bear on some of the most
desperate situations people face around
the world. Its downloadable software
allows users to submit eyewitness reports
during a conflict or disaster; the collected
reports are displayed on a map. At times
when ordinary sources of news and pub­
lic information are unavailable, Ushahidi
gives users a way to share information and
shape political opinion, guide rescuers, or
pool resources. Ushahidi has been used to
monitor elections in Sudan, document vio­
lence in Gaza, track the BP oil slick, and
assist earthquake recovery efforts in Haiti.
Ushahidi was born during the riots that
followed Kenya’s 2007 presidential elec­
tion. President Mwai Kibaki had imposed
a media blackout throughout the East Afri­
can nation, so the Internet provided the
only open channels of mass communica­
tion. David Kobia was 8,000 miles away
in Birmingham, AL. A Kenyan expatriate
who had dropped out of the University of
Alabama at Birmingham to work as a Web
developer, Kobia was frantically trying to
moderate an online forum, Mashada, that
had started as a personal project but was
becoming a very public arena for Kenyan
politics. Discussions on the site were spi­
raling into vitriol and paranoia. A French
news agency reporting on Mashada called
it Kenya’s answer to Radio Mille Collines,
the infamous Rwandan radio station that
had fueled that country’s genocide in 1994.
“Being mentioned in the same sentence
as Radio Mille Collines is akin to being
44 tr 35
Sept10 TR35 p44-53.indd 44
called a Nazi,” says Kobia, a gentle man
with an open face and an easy smile. Beset
by remorse and despair, he pulled the plug
on Mashada, got into his car, and sped up
Interstate 20, planning to spend a som­
ber winter holiday with friends in Atlanta.
Somewhere near the Georgia border, his
cell phone rang. An online acquaintance,
Erik Hersman, was calling. Hersman had
read a post by a prominent Kenyan blog­
ger, Ory Okolloh, calling for someone with
the know­how to program a Google map
to track the violence and destruction. “Can
you put it together?” Hersman asked. See­
ing an opportunity to atone for Mashada,
Kobia turned around and headed back to
Birmingham. Two days later, Ushahidi was
up and running.
That initial version was simple: just a
map and a form that let users describe an
incident, select the nearest town, and note
the location, date, and time. Nonetheless,
it was enough to attract widespread atten­
tion. “Suddenly my phone was ringing off
the hook to do an interview with BBC
News or NPR,” Kobia says.
By now, Ushahidi—the name means
“testimony” in Swahili—has played a cen­
tral role in coördinating the responses to
crises around the globe. Kobia, with the
help of Hersman, Okolloh, program direc­
tor Juliana Rotich, and a growing number
of coders, has continued to develop and
expand the original no­frills online appli­
cation into a downloadable open­source
platform that includes a time line, an API
to develop applications for mobile devices,
an architecture that allows functionality to
be added through software plug­ins, and
support for several mapping protocols. It
has been used in more than 30 countries,
mostly by grassroots relief and watchdog
organizations, to direct aid workers to spe­
cific locations, document corruption, and
track complex events in space and time.
“Ushahidi is one of the most globally sig­
nificant technology projects,” says Ethan
Zuckerman, cofounder of the blog network
Global Voices and a senior researcher at
Harvard’s Berkman Center for Internet
and Society. “It’s built on open standards
and accepts input not only from the Web
but from mobile devices—a critical feature
for enabling global participation. And it
evolves with each installation, resulting
in a system that can aggregate, map, and
authenticate crowdsourced data in a very
wide range of environments.”
Redemption
Kobia grew up in Kenya, the son of a civil
engineer and a schoolteacher. He moved
to America to study computer science at
the University of Alabama in 1998. By
that time, the dot­com boom was under
way, and Kobia left school to build pub­
lishing platforms for Time Inc., Reader’s
Digest, and Cygnus Publications and also
for sites that automated processes such as
hiring or booking travel. Through those
projects, he gained the deep knowledge
of online infrastructure that made it pos­
yvo n n e b oyd
sible for him to assemble the first version
of Ushahidi so quickly.
t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w s e p t e m b e r / o c t o b e r 2010
8/10/10 10:45 AM
 LONG REACH
David Kobia’s Web
programming helps
communities facing
catastrophe around
the world.

Sept10 TR35 p44-53.indd 45 8/10/10 10:45 AM

 35
35

Soon after Ushahidi came online, Kobia

“Ushahidi is one of the most globally
significant technology projects. ”
was contacted by NetSquared, a nonprofit
that promotes the Web as a vehicle for
social change. The organizers invited the
Ushahidi team to enter its Mashup Chal­
—Ethan Zuckerman
lenge, and Kobia flew to San Jose, CA.
Walking among the gathered Silicon Valley
hipsters, he thought that a group of Afri­ NetSquared and a grant from Humanity audio, and video. It uses another open­
cans had little chance. To his great surprise, United. Later, he secured some $700,000 source program, FrontlineSMS, to aggre­
Ushahidi won the competition. It was a tri­ from philanthropies including the Cisco, gate text messages, making good use of the
umphant moment for Kobia, who still felt Knight, and MacArthur foundations. The cell phones that are ubiquitous in the devel­
lingering guilt for the Mashada forum. “I result is a system that packs tremendous oping world even where computers are rare.
felt drunk with redemption,” he says. communication power into a simple user Incoming incident reports queue up on
Returning to Birmingham, Kobia interface. The platform collects incident a dashboard screen where administrators—
wrapped up his business and threw himself reports through e­mail, status updates, and usually volunteers for organizations that
into Ushahidi, funded by $25,000 from blog posts; reports can include text, photos, have downloaded Ushahidi and set it up
on a server—can categorize and vet them
by cross­checking against news and other
2010 tR35 Judges information online. Within minutes of
arrival, messages deemed valid are posted
ed Boyden* phil Janson John Rogers* to a public Web page, where they appear on
Leader, Synthetic Adjunct professor, École Professor of engineering, a map as colored dots that grow as reports
neurobiology group, MIT Polytechnique Fédérale de University of Illinois at Urbana-
Lausanne Champaign from those locations accumulate.
george Church
Professor of genetics, ed lazowska Chris R. Somerville
Harvard Medical School Professor of computer science, director, energy biosci- Helping Haiti

James J. Collins*
Professor of biomedical engi-
neering, boston University
Yi Cui*
Associate professor of materi-
als science and engineering,
Stanford University
david Culler
Professor of computer
science, University of Califor-
nia, berkeley
mildred S. dresselhaus
Professor of physics and
electrical engineering, MIT
Stephen H. Friend
Ceo, Sage bionetworks
Kevin Fu*
Assistant professor of com-
puter science, University of
Massachusetts, Amherst
Javier garcía-martínez*
Professor of inorganic chem-
istry, University of Alicante
Scott Heiferman*
Ceo, Meetup
eric Horvitz
Principal researcher,
Microsoft Research
University of Washington
Johnny Chung lee*
Researcher, Microsoft
nick mcKeown
Professor of electrical engi-
neering and computer sci-
ence, Stanford University
Christopher B. murray*
Professor of chemistry,
materials science, and
engineering, University
of Pennsylvania
Krishna V. palem
Professor of computer
science, Rice University
Stephen Quake*
Professor of bioengineering,
Stanford University
prabhakar Raghavan
Head of research,
yahoo Labs
nimmi Ramanujam*
Associate professor of
biomedical engineering,
duke University
dipankar Raychaudhuri
Professor of communications,
Rutgers University
ences Institute, University of
California, berkeley
Bjarne Stroustrup
Professor of computer
science, Texas A&M University
Susie Wee*
CTo, Client Cloud Services,
Hewlett-Packard
Jennifer West*
Professor of bioengineering,
Rice University
John Wiss
Adjunct professor of mechani-
cal engineering, Carnegie
Mellon University
Jackie Ying*
director, Institute of bioengi-
neering and nanotechnology
Ben Y. Zhao*
Associate professor of
computer science, University
of California, Santa barbara
Victor Zue
Professor of electrical
engineering and computer
science, MIT
*Past TR100/TR35 honoree
After receiving the NetSquared prize,
Ushahidi played a role in crisis after cri­
sis as tech­savvy grassroots organizations
downloaded the platform. With each
implementation, it grew as users requested
features and Kobia and a growing team of
developers obliged. The most challeng­
ing test came early this year. On the eve­
ning of January 12, 2010, Kobia received
an urgent phone call from Patrick Meier,
director of crisis mapping and strategic
partnerships at Ushahidi and founder of
the International Network of Crisis Map­
pers, an Internet­based group that brings
together cartographers, imaging experts,
and specialists in crisis management. He
was looking for ways that digital mapping
might help Haiti cope with the aftermath
of the earthquake that had just struck.
Kobia set up a Ushahidi website for
the crisis, and within hours, the system
was fielding reports of human misery on
a vast scale—25,000 text messages and
4,500,000 Twitter posts before the month

46 tr 35 t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w s e p t e m b e r / o c t o b e r 2010

Sept10 TR35 p44-53.indd 46 8/10/10 10:45 AM

 Ground TruTh Ushahidi helped coördinate responses
to the 2010 Haitian earthquake (above, and mapped at top
right). The system grew out of the response to a disputed
Kenyan election in 2007 (mapped at bottom right).

was out. Working through the U.S. State
Department, he arranged with Haitian
telecommunications companies to sup-
ply a four-digit SMS code for emergency
messages. Aid workers in Haiti distributed
the number on printed flyers.
The bulk of incoming incident reports
were written in Creole, so Ushahidi
arranged for some 10,000 Haitian expa-
P H OTO: C H e s n OT/s i Pa/as s O C iaTe d P r e s s; s C r e e n s H OTs: U s HaH i d i
hand, Kobia was thrilled to see the system
rise to the occasion. On the other, the effort
almost drove his team into the ground. “We
put in 20-hour days for a month,” he says.
“Developers were getting burned out.” He
realized that the organization was failing
in its goal of giving others the ability to use
the platform independently.
Since then, Kobia has focused much of
might pay for Crowdmap’s services or
license other parts of the Ushahidi tech-
nology. This is necessary, Kobia says, to
insulate Ushahidi from the whims of
charity, about which he is deeply ambiva-
lent. “In truth, I don’t like nonprofits,” he
says. “They’ve never solved any problems.
Instead, they’ve destroyed free enterprise
and turned Africans into beggars. Some of

triates in North America to serve as transla-
tors, first through a custom system and later
through a partnership with the commer-
cial crowdsourcing website CrowdFlower.
Meanwhile, Meier organized Tufts Uni-
versity students to log reports around the
clock. First responders, including mem-
bers of the U.S. military, used Ushahidi’s
map to set priorities, organize, and reach
distressed people.
Ushahidi had a decisive impact on the
Haitian crisis—and vice versa. On the one
his energy on making Ushahidi more
accessible and easier to operate. For
instance, an initiative called Crowdmap
delivers Ushahidi’s functionality directly
over the Web, so local groups don’t have
to install it on servers of their own. He’s
also working on a system that uses
machine learning and natural-language
processing to evaluate the validity of
incoming data.
Some of these efforts might ultimately
generate revenue: larger organizations
the best programmers in Kenya are work-
ing for nonprofits when they could be cre-
ating an economy. Ushahidi’s challenge is
not to get caught in that cycle.”
To that end, Kobia has started an
innovation center meant to galvanize
Nairobi’s burgeoning high-tech commu-
nity. “There’s a pool of mind-blowing talent
waiting to be tapped,” he says. “We remind
them, ‘It’s your duty to participate in this
community and build your own busi-
nesses.’ ” —Ted Greenwald

w w w . t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w . c o m tr 35 47

Sept10 TR35 p44-53.indd 47 8/11/10 12:04 PM

 sOCiAL sLEUTH
Danah Boyd is uncov-
ering the unexpected
effects of networking
sites.

mar K o stoW

48 feature story t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w s e p t e m b e r / o c t o b e r 2010

Sept10 TR35 p44-53.indd 48 8/10/10 10:45 AM

 35
35

I nTE r n ET

Danah
Boyd, 32
Shaping the rules for
social networks
Microsoft Research
electrodes detect
activity from muscles.
AS MORe and more people
join social-networking sites,
Danah Boyd is asking and
answering some uncomfort-
able questions about these
online communities. Among hAnds frEE
This armband can
other things, she has detailed translate the com-
how race has been a factor in plex muscle activity
some users’ migration from involved in gestures
into signals that
MySpace to Facebook, how
control electronic
social networks are chang- devices.
The armband can
ing the way teenagers relate process the activity
to one another, and how the when multiple mus-
cles are used.
Internet alters the way peo-
ple think about privacy. signals are sent to a
Working as an advi- computer wirelessly.

sor, Boyd has shaped the

policies of companies like
Google and LiveJournal. h A r dWA r E

T. Scott Saponas, 29
Now employed by Micro-
soft Research New england,
she has been talking with
Detecting complex gestures with an armband interface
government regulators and
Microsoft Research
privacy advocacy groups to
determine how best to help

users protect their personal
information. She believes
that privacy regulation is
inevitable and is trying to
guide the industry and regu-
lators toward a set of mutu-
ally acceptable rules.
Critical to any such solu-
tion, Boyd says, is making
sure that people can control
what happens to their per-
sonal data after it has been
b ryan C H r i sTi e d e s i g n
F
ingers flicking through the air, T. Scott Saponas is rocking a solo in the video game Guitar
Hero—without a guitar. A soft band around his forearm monitors the muscles moving
his fingers and hand. The band hides a ring of six electrodes that pick up the weak electri-
cal signals produced by active muscle tissue. The signals are relayed to a computer, which
in turn controls the game.
Most previous work on muscle interfaces has focused on controlling broad movements of
prosthetic limbs by detecting the activity of individual muscles. To recognize more detailed
gestures, Saponas developed software capable of processing the jumble of signals from the
mass of muscles in the arm. The system has potential for more than just video games. A
jogger using Saponas’s armband could tense his or her hand muscles to switch tracks on an
MP3 player without breaking stride, or a mechanic whose hands were busy inside an engine
could use it to control a heads-up display.

entered into a social network. Saponas created the software as a graduate student at the University of Washington.
—Erica Naone Now working at Microsoft Research, he is interested in combining the muscle interface
with other sensors, including accelerometers and gyroscopes, to provide additional pre-
cision. —Tom Simonite

w w w . t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w . c o m tr 35 49

Sept10 TR35 p44-53.indd 49 8/11/10 12:04 PM


M AT E r I A ls
Michael
McAlpine, 32
Powering electronics with
human motion
Princeton University
M
ichael McAlpine has developed a flex-
ible material that produces record
amounts of energy when subjected to
mechanical pressure. It could turn the action
of a patient’s lungs into enough energy to
power an implanted medical device; forces
produced by walking around could be suf-
ficient to drive portable electronics.
In 2008, as a new assistant professor
at Princeton, McAlpine started thinking
about pacemakers: was there a way to har-
vest power from the lungs as people inhaled
and exhaled, so that the batteries wouldn’t
need to be surgically replaced every few
50 tr 35
Sept10 TR35 p44-53.indd 50
1
3
years? Drawing on previous experience in
making nanowire electronics and sensors
on sheets of plastic, McAlpine began exper-
imenting with PZT, a well-known material
that is piezoelectric—able to convert physi-
cal stress into electricity. To make a flexible
sTrEss TEsT Michael Mcalpine sand-
wiches ribbons of PZT between layers of sili-
cone or plastic (1) and then attaches leads (2) to
make a flexible device that generates electric-
ity when bent (3). These devices might one day
power pacemakers or other implanted devices,
bending back and forth as a patient’s lungs
inflate and deflate.
device, he deposits the PZT onto a hard sub-
strate before carving the material into tiny
ribbons. Then he uses chemicals to release
the ribbons of PZT from the substrate and
transfers them to a piece of silicone. A sec-
ond piece of silicone seals the PZT in, creat-
ing a pliable, biocompatible material that’s
four times as efficient as previous flexible
piezoelectrics. So far McAlpine has made
only small pieces of the material, but he is
now scaling up the process to make larger
ryan d O n n e ll
wafers suitable for use in implanted elec-
tronics. —Katherine Bourzac
t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w s e p t e m b e r / o c t o b e r 2010
8/11/10 12:04 PM
 35
35

T E l E c o M M u n I cAT I o n s

Amir Alexander Hasson, 34

I nTE r n ET

David Karp, 24
Using cell phones to supply rural shop owners a platform that keeps
United Villages bloggers blogging
Tumblr

M
MainTaining a blOg takes
any shop owners in Indian villages are beyond the reach of major distribu- stamina: of the more than 100
tors. Some goods are sold to them by local producers, but owners “have to million blogs surveyed by the
leave their shops four times a month to get 81 percent of the stuff that they sell,” search engine Technorati in 2008,
says Amir Alexander Hasson. Having to travel to restock doesn’t just affect shop fewer than 10 percent had been
updated in the previous four
owners; villagers end up paying higher prices for a smaller selection of goods. Since
months. david Karp thought that
founding United Villages in 2004, Hasson has been using wireless technologies simplifying posting would stop
to help solve this and other problems facing the rural poor in developing nations. users from falling away, so he cre-
Hasson started out with a system that helped people in isolated communi- ated Tumblr, a streamlined blog
ties send and receive e-mail and search for jobs. Wi-Fi routers were attached to platform. The result? Of the site’s
buses; when a bus drove into a village, its router connected with computers set six and a half million registered
users, 85 percent post more than
up at local kiosks. Now Hasson is taking advantage of the rapid expansion of
20 times a month on average.
cell-phone networks to set up a for-profit wholesale service called e-Shop. Shop Within a few minutes of signing
owners with phones that run Java applications can browse an online catalogue up with Tumblr, users can submit
and place orders; data is transferred between the phones and United Villages their first post by browser, e-mail,
using SMS text messages. This method is cheap and doesn’t require powerful iM, or even voice. and with large
smart phones. In about 36 hours, the goods are delivered directly to the shop. buttons dedicated to posting music,
video, and photos, it encourages
Hasson is planning to introduce another use of e-Shop, as a way for people
users to go beyond the blocks of
to post advertisements through a local store owner. “For [50 cents], someone can text that are the mainstay of typi-
post his motorbike for sale,” says Hasson, “It will be India’s first mobile-based cal blogging and social websites.
classifieds.” —Nidhi Subbaraman social-networking features such
as following, favoriting, reblogging,
and syndication offer ways to give
users the positive feedback that
keeps them contributing.
Karp launched Tumblr in early
2007. Two weeks later, the site had
75,000 registered users. so far, it
has taken in about $10 million in
venture funding, but it doesn’t need
much. “it’s the most capital-efficient
company i’m familiar with,” says
bijan sabet of spark Capital.
lately, Tumblr has been adding
750,000 users a month, prompt-
ing Karp to try new ways to bring in
revenue. He is charging for promo-
tional spots that let users advertise
their blogs and for premium page
layouts to make blogs stand out.
and if these strategies don’t work?
“i can always move back in with my
parents,” he says. —Ted Greenwald
U n iTe d vi llag e s

KIosK connEcTIon United villages brings the benefits of wireless technology to the
rural poor through local shop owners.

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 35
35

Stamp

Second layer of
First layer of Cells
gelled collagen h A r dWA r e

Aaron
gelled collagen

Dollar, 32
Creating flexible
robotic hands
Yale University

AARON DOLLAR, an assistant

professor of mechanical engi­
Liquid collagen neering at Yale, has invented
Starting shapes a robot with a soft touch. His
plastic hand is deft enough to
forM And fu nction grasp a wide variety of objects
organs grow from small cell clus- without damaging them.
ters. by using different stamps to
vary the shapes of these clusters, What’s more, it’s cheaper
Celeste nelson is teasing out how and requires less processing
important tissue structures develop. power than the metal hands
typically used in robots.
B i ot e c h n o lo GY Dollar’s design uses plastic

Celeste Nelson, 34
growing and branching
tissue network fingers that can lightly brush
against an object—whether
Reconstructing tissue architectures from scratch it’s a wine glass, beach ball, or
Princeton University telephone—before firming up
their grip. Few researchers
have used soft plastic in robot­

H
ow do organs such as the lungs or kid­
neys generate the intricate, treelike
internal anatomy essential to their function?
To find out, Celeste Nelson developed a lab
technique for growing structures from sim­
ple shapes like the ones from which organs
begin developing in the embryo. Nelson
knew, for example, that lungs begin as an
inverted Y. By experimenting with differ­
ent shapes, such as a T instead of a Y, she
discovered that the exact form of these ini­
tial structures plays a pivotal role in how the
tissue’s sophisticated architecture develops.
Different starting shapes produce different
patterns and concentrations of signaling
molecules. The molecules cause growing
branches to repel each other. Subsequent
mechanical stresses in the branches deter­
mine where new branches will begin to
develop and, in turn, produce their own sig­
ics before, partly because it
in tissue development. But Nelson’s tech­
can be difficult to shape small,
nique—adapted from a process originally
precise parts out of such mate­
used to make computer chips—allowed her
rials. To get around this prob­
to prove it for the first time, and to spell out lem, Dollar mills wax molds
the mechanism involved. for each finger. He places sen­
Nelson, now an assistant professor of sors and cables in the molds
chemical engineering at Princeton, has and then pours in layers of
worked with her group to identify several three types of plastic with
genes that need to be present and functional varying degrees of softness—
for branching tissue to develop properly, and for fingers, joints, and finger
they are trying to figure out how those genes pads. Once the plastics harden
work together to orchestrate the process. and are removed from the
She hopes that understanding how branch­ molds, the fingers are ready
ing normally happens will reveal ways to to be hooked up to a base.
intervene when it goes awry. Recent work Dollar’s design has already
has shown, for example, that the signals that been licensed to one robotics
spur branching—which are typically silent manufacturer, and because it
once development is complete—are reawak­ replicates the flexibility and
ened in some tumors. In addition, her tech­ gentleness of a human hand,
niques for building three­dimensional tissue he is investigating whether it
e M I Ly C o o P e R

naling molecules. Other researchers had structures could ultimately be used to help could work as a prosthetic.
previously theorized that geometry matters engineer replacement organs. —Jocelyn Rice —Kristina Grifantini

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 flexible joints

Soft finger pads

Stiff knuckles

Hand base

flexible fingers
this hand has fingers
made of three plastics with
different degrees of hard-
ness. the fingers are made
p o rte r g i f fo r d

in one piece by pour-

ing the plastics into wax
molds, layer by layer.

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 35
35
MIX AnD MAtCh aviary’s
cloud-based Web applications
allow users to mix and match
elements from their creations,
creating derivative works that
can be shared in turn.
I ntE r n Et
Avi Muchnick, 31
Cloud-based multimedia
editing software
Aviary
“EVERYOnE wants to be an artist,”
says Avi Muchnick, sitting amid the
clutter of his startup’s new Manhattan
headquarters. Muchnick’s company,
Aviary, makes free Web-based soft-
ware for creating and editing images
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Sept10 TR35 p54-63.indd 54
and sounds. Users can do everything
from tweaking photographs to com-
posing complex multitrack musical
arrangements.
Aviary’s tools aren’t as powerful as
commercial applications like Adobe
Photoshop, an expensive photo edit-
ing program that professionals use.
But because all user data is stored on a
cloud-computing platform, users can
easily share not just finished works
but all the individual elements that
went into a work; if someone creates a
graphic of a teacup for a poster about a
public reading of Alice in Wonderland,
someone else can extract that graphic
and use it in a logo for a café. Aviary
tracks how and where elements are
used, making sure that licenses and
credits are preserved. Ultimately, the
company hopes to create a market-
place where creators can charge royal-
ties for their work, with Aviary taking
a cut. Since the company was founded
in 2007, Muchnick has raised $11 mil-
C o u rte sy o f aviary
lion in venture capital and angel fund-
ing from investors such as Amazon
founder Jeff Bezos. —Stephen Cass
t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w s e p t e m b e r / o c t o b e r 2010
8/10/10 4:51 PM
 sOLAr sELLEr
acoustic printing could
make solar cells less
expensive.
E n E r gy

Chris Rivest, 28
Printing cheaper solar cells
SunPrint

T
he lowest-cost solar panels on the market
are made using thin-film solar cells that
cost about 80 cents per watt of electricity they
produce; costs for other types of cells can be as
high as $2 per watt. Those prices are too high if
solar power is to displace coal and natural gas.
But Chris Rivest has a plan to reduce the price
of solar cells to well under 50 cents per watt.
Rivest cofounded SunPrint in 2008 to build
cheaper solar cells using a process called acous-
tic printing, originally developed by Xerox for
ink-jet printers. Focusing a sound wave onto
a pool of ink causes droplets to spatter onto
a nearby surface. Rivest and his cofound-
ers designed and built an acoustic printer to
deposit layers of ink containing cadmium tel-
luride, one of the most cost-effective solar-cell
materials available, on glass, plastic, or metal.
Because acoustic printing provides finer con-
trol than other printing methods, the tech-
nique uses 50 percent less cadmium telluride
and eliminates further processing steps that
require expensive tools. Rivest expects com-
mercial production of solar panels to begin
within a year or so. —Neil Savage

I ntE r n Et of legitimate messages and spam

Nick Feamster, 31
Watching the suspicious
behavior of spam
Georgia Tech
for years, e-mail providers, it
departments, and network opera-
tors have fought spam with the
to by b u r d itt (r ive st); f eam ste r??
should be different.
for example, feamster found
that spammers often try to hide in
“dark space”—normally uncon-
nected internet addresses. sud-
denly, a previously unreachable
block of addresses would light up,
send out a bunch of messages,
and then disappear. Watching for
phantom networks that appear for

help of technology that examines 10 minutes at a time turned out

what messages say. Nick feamster,
an assistant professor at Georgia
tech, had a better idea. instead of
examining content, he looks at how
messages move through networks,
on the theory that the traffic flow
to be one way to identify and stop
spam. His strategies have been
adopted by companies such as
yahoo and mcafee in their ongo- gLOBAL gUnK Nick feamster’s
ing struggle to prevent spam from research team tracks the regions of
reaching users. —Erica Naone the world most afflicted by spam.

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 35
35
Copper current
collector
Liquid electrolyte
Porous cathode
aluminum current
collector
solid dual-polymer
separator
sOLID sUCCEss With a
solid mixture of two polymers
replacing the liquid electrolyte
used in traditional lithium-ion
cells (top), seeo’s batteries
(right) can store more energy.
E n E r gy
Hany Eitouni, 33
Making safer batteries with solid polymers
Seeo
H
any Eitouni has built batteries that are
safer, longer-lasting, and able to store
more energy in a smaller space than the con-
ventional lithium-ion cells commonly used
today. His technology, Eitouni says, could
be used in next-generation electric cars and
even in the electric grid, which would be a
new application for lithium-ion batteries.
While working at the Lawrence Berkeley
national Lab, Eitouni figured out how to
replace the most dangerous component of
lithium-ion batteries: a flammable liquid
electrolyte that conducts electricity between
the positive and negative electrodes. The
more energy packed into a battery, the
higher the danger that the liquid electrolyte
will catch fire. Previous researchers had
tried to sidestep this problem by using gel
polymers for the electrolyte, but even these
contained flammable solvents.
The solution was a solid material that is
made of two linked polymer chains. One
56 tr 35
Sept10 TR35 p54-63.indd 56
I ntE r n Et
Wesley
Porous anode
Chan, 32
Porous separator
Building new
Lithium anode
technology businesses
Google
WESLEY CHAn has a knack for
turning good ideas into new
businesses—and doing it with
minimal resources. In 2005,
Chan’s small team at google,
which incorporated two start-
ups he acquired for the company,
launched google Analytics to
provide a free version of the
Polymer cathode tools the search giant previ-
ously used internally. In 2006,
he dreamed up another free
service, google Voice, which
aluminum current
collector
launched in 2009. This one
offers automatic transcrip-
tion of voice mail, the ability
to use one number for differ-
ent phones, and many other
features. given only two com-
polymer is almost as conductive as a tra-
pany engineers to work with on
ditional liquid electrolyte but a lot less
the project, Chan acquired the
flammable; the other, which is also less
startup grandCentral in 2007;
flammable, provides mechanical stabil- he and his new crew spent the
ity so that the electrolyte doesn’t turn into next two years putting the ser-
goo. And the battery lasts longer than tra- vice together in secret.
ditional lithium-ion or previous lithium- google Voice now has millions
polymer cells because the polymer doesn’t of users. But Chan has moved
react with the charged electrodes. on again and is now a partner at
To commercialize the technology, google’s venture capital invest-
Eitouni cofounded Seeo in Berkeley, CA, in ment group, google Ventures.
2007. He says that the startup’s battery keeps He still invests in software but is
90 percent of its storage capacity after 2,000 free to cast his net wider. In par-
charges (traditional rechargeable batteries ticular, he is developing an inter-
lose nearly a third of their capacity after est in stem-cell medicine, even
about 500 charges). It also stores 50 percent though the field has no direct
more energy per kilogram than commer- connection to google’s business.
cial lithium-ion batteries. Seeo is building He says, “For me it’s about going
a pilot factory that will make large battery where I can learn the most, and
packs to smooth out spikes in supply and making the output of my learn-
e m i Ly C o o P e r
demand on the electric grid. It’s expected to ing something that is world-
be completed in 2011. —Kate Greene changing.” —Tom Simonite
t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w s e p t e m b e r / o c t o b e r 2010
8/10/10 4:51 PM
 thE COACh at
Google, Wesley Chan
displayed a knack for
building teams to fill
technology niches.
to by b u r d itt

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35

s O f t wA r E

Richard
Tibbetts, 30
reacting to large amounts
of data in real time
StreamBase Systems

orGaNizatioNs suCH as
businesses and governments
are increasingly obsessed
with gathering data, but the
results often overwhelm
them when they need to act
quickly. richard tibbetts, Cto
of streambase systems in
Lexington, ma, has developed
a data processing system that
can accept large amounts of
rapidly changing input and dis-
till it into the information that
organizations feel they need to
make sound decisions.
traditionally, organizations
have turned to databases to
store and manipulate large
amounts of information. typi-
cally, however, these databases
aren’t good at processing data
in real time; users have to wait
until an entire data set has B I Ot E C h n O LO gy

been accumulated. but tib-

betts has invented a new set Mikhail Shapiro, 29
of techniques for managing Commercializing neurotechnology
data. in particular, he invented
Third Rock Ventures
a language called streamsQL
eventflow, which can process a

stream of data as it arrives, ana-
lyze it, make decisions about it,
and take actions such as trading
a stock or flagging a trend.
streambase counts gov-
ernment agencies, invest-
ment banks, and hedge
funds among its clients. the
technology has been used to
monitor activity on battle-
fields as combat unfolds and
to help businesses react
as stock market conditions
change. —Erica Naone
W
ho better to determine which fledgling
technologies should form the basis of
new venture-backed biotech companies than
someone who’s helped develop significant new
neurotechnologies and has firsthand experi-
ence with launching a revolutionary startup?
In 2001, Mikhail Shapiro, still a sophomore at
Brown University, cofounded a company called
Cyberkinetics to develop implantable devices
that would allow quadriplegics to control exter-
nal devices with their thoughts. Shapiro, then
20, ran the business side of the company and
helped raise its first $20 million in venture fund-
ing, which led to groundbreaking clinical trials.
and engineering at Brown, who was chief sci-
entific officer of the startup. Though Cyberki-
netics has since folded, the results of its pilot
trials proved that this type of technology could
work, and they brought new funding and inter-
est to the field.
Shapiro then earned a PhD at MIT, where he
developed a noninvasive imaging technology
for observing chemical messengers in the brain.
Since joining Third Rock Ventures in 2008, he
has led the venture capital firm’s efforts to eval-
uate neurotechnologies such as optogenetics, a
method of controlling the brain with light. So far
he has helped found two more companies, with
j e s s i Ca s C raNto N

“His knowledge of the business world even at combined funding of $50 million. One is focused
that young age was frightening,” says cofounder on a new pain drug and the other on using per-
John Donoghue, a professor of neuroscience sonalized medicine to fight cancer. —Emily Singer

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 B I Ot E c h n O LO gy

Samuel Sia, 34
Inexpensive microfluidic
chips for diagnostics
Columbia University

USing cheap components and

few moving parts, Samuel Sia, an
assistant professor at Columbia
University, has helped create a
microfluidic chip that tests blood
samples for multiple diseases
and is practical for use in poor
countries. The chips cost pennies
instead of dollars to make, and
the results are read with a small
battery-powered device.
inventing the technology was
just one step: Sia has given equal
emphasis to getting it used. He
and his partners wanted to
develop microfluidics for use in
poor countries, but they realized
they would have trouble finding
funding for such a venture. So
in 2004 they founded a company,
Claros Diagnostics, to create a
prostate-cancer monitor for use
in the United States and Europe.
They received $7.8 million in ven-
ture funding in 2007, and mar-
keting approval was granted in
j o s H ua s c ott
worked full time on that device,
Sia modified the technology to
create a test for sexually transmit-
ted diseases, including HiV, syphi-
lis, and hepatitis.
intending the test for use in
Africa, he then orchestrated a
number of field trials in collabora-
tion with Columbia’s school of
DIAgnOstIc DEvIcE
made using plastic injection
molding, this microfluidic chip is
inexpensive to produce. small
amounts of reagents and a
fluid sample from a patient are
guided through its tiny chan-
nels to test for stds.
progressed further than many
other attempts to deploy new
medical technologies in the
developing world, but he still faces
the hurdle of finding funding to
commercialize the chip. “There
are mechanisms to get money to
develop new technology,” he says.
“But getting funding to implement

Europe in June of this year (see To public health and the Rwandan it [on a broad scale] is very diffi-
Market, p. 21). While Sia’s partners government. His efforts have cult.”—Emily Singer

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 35
35

M At E r I A Ls

Michelle
Povinelli, 34
Predicting better
photonic devices
University of Southern California

UnDERSTAnDIng precisely
how light behaves as it moves
through devices such as solar cells
or optical chips will lead to more
fAIL-sAfE efficient devices—and reveal new
schoolchildren play-
ing this game must
physical phenomena that engi-
face monsters when neers can exploit. To this end,
crossing roads; theoretical physicist Michelle
the unpredictable
behavior of the mon- Povinelli is creating models of
sters is derived from how photons interact with com-
real traffic data.
plex materials.
In one surprising finding,
I ntE r n Et Povinelli correctly predicted that

Kati London, 34 light being guided down a strip

of silicon would exert a mechani-
Teaching real-world skills through games cal force on an adjacent strip. If
Area/Code
moving parts driven by light were
incorporated into optical circuits

K
ati London is blending the virtual and physical worlds to and used to reroute light signals,
entertain—and to shape the real-life behavior of players. the light might not have to be con-
London, a vice president and senior producer at new York–based verted into electricity for process-
game company Area/Code, makes games that incorporate real- ing and then back to light again.
world data ranging from the mundane (the locations of players) Making better solar cells may
to the exotic (signals from tracking devices attached to sharks sound very different from opti-
in the Pacific). Many of her games are just for fun, but others cal communications, but under-
are more serious.
standing how light interacts with
For example, the U.K.’s Department for Transport commis-
a device is equally important in
sioned Area/Code to make an online game for children aged 9 to
this context. Povinelli is work-
13, the group most at risk of being killed or seriously injured while
ing on models to predict the effi-
crossing the street. When users reach a road in the fantasy-themed
ciency of solar cells that have
game, they can cross at designated safe spots and must look both
different nanostructures. Finding
ways for monsters. The monsters’ behavior reflects that of vehi-
cles; at some crossings, their speed and number is based directly the ultimate efficiency for these
on traffic data from actual intersections in the U.K. By replicating cells will set a boundary on what
the unpredictable variations in the appearance, speed, and number researchers can hope to achieve
of vehicles, London believes, the game teaches skills that children and guide them toward photovol-
m i s Ha G rave N o r

need to handle real traffic. More than 160,000 players have been taics that are less expensive but
registered since the game was introduced last year, and an inde- much better at generating elec-
pendent evaluation is due out next spring. —Kristina Grifantini tricity. —Katherine Bourzac

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 s O f t wA r E
Jian Sun, 33
Better image searches
Microsoft Research Asia
PRoBLEM: images are hard
for search engines to index
because computers find it dif-
ficult to identify their content.
Algorithms called classifiers
can sort images using statistical
techniques, but that presents
something of a chicken-and-
egg problem: ideally, “you need
millions of [classified] images
to train a classifier,” says Jian
Sun, a researcher at Microsoft
Research Asia in Beijing.
SoLUTion: Sun devel-
oped a way to make it easy for
humans to train computers in
picture classification. With his
system, which was recently
incorporated into Microsoft’s
Bing images search engine,
users enter a search term—say,
“cloudy sky.” Using its existing
classification algorithm, Bing
makes its best attempt to pres-
ent a grid of images that match
the search term. The user can
click on a nearly right image
and ask to see similar pictures,
repeating the process until the
perfect image appears. As the
user refines the search, each
click is fed back into the classi-
fier. This means the next time a
user searches for “cloudy sky,”
Bing will immediately present
a more relevant set of images
than before. The system is
also being used to help other
researchers develop image
search algorithms; incorporat-
ing results from Bing, Sun has
released a training database
containing 100,000 catego-
rized images. —David Cohen
62 tr 35
Sept10 TR35 p54-63.indd 62
LEArnIng MAchInE bing lets users refine
search results (top), producing images that better
match a search term (middle). New searches will
then produce better initial results (bottom).
B I Ot E c h n O LO gy
Timothy Lu, 29
Engineering viruses to
destroy biofilms
Ascendia Biotechnology, MIT
A
t Harvard Medical School, many of
Timothy Lu’s patients were being
attacked by carpets of microbial goo.
They had “really bad infections,” Lu says.
“Patients with cystic fibrosis, people get-
ting infections in their catheters. All caused
by biofilms.”
Lu, who is now an assistant professor
at MiT, began researching how to destroy
biofilms. But unlike those who had previ-
ously attacked the problem, he took advan-
tage of the new tools of synthetic biology.
He engineered a type of virus, known as
a phage, to destroy biofilms and sabotage
their defenses against antibiotics. His
accomplishment could produce synthetic
biology’s first big commercial success by
attacking the biofilms that infest industrial
equipment.
When bacteria settle on a surface, they
spew out molecules that bind the entire
population together and cover it in a pro-
tective shield. Bacteria in these biofilms
are up to 500 times more resistant to anti-
biotics than free-floating microbes are.
normally, viruses have a hard time pen-
etrating the dense layers of a biofilm. But
Lu stumbled across an enzyme produced
by oral bacteria that can break up biofilms.
He inserted the gene for the enzyme into
a phage called T7 so that when the virus
infects a microbe, it makes as much of the
enzyme as possible.
When the engineered T7 is unleashed on
a biofilm, it invades the top layer of bacte-
ria. These bacteria soon burst open, spill-
ing out enzymes and new phages. Aided by
the enzyme, the viruses then penetrate the
next layer of bacteria, repeating the cycle
until the biofilm is destroyed. Lu and his
colleagues have also found other ways to
t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w s e p t e m b e r / o c t o b e r 2010
8/11/10 3:44 PM

engineered phage
the bane of bIofIlms Bacteria bound together in a protective matrix tend to resist viral
attack. But Lu’s virus produces an enzyme that breaks up these biofilms. When it infects the bacteria
on the biofilm’s surface, they burst and release viruses that infect those underneath, soon exposing
even deeply embedded bacteria to infection.
turn phages into effective weapons against
biofilms, such as creating versions that can
shut down the genes that bacteria use to
defend themselves against antibiotics.
Last year Lu cofounded Novophage
(now called Ascendia Biotechnology) to
develop commercial applications for the
B ryAn C h r I stI e D e s I g n
phages. The company is initially concen-
trating on biofilms that Lu says can cor-
rode water pipes and block heat transfer
in heating and cooling systems, decreasing
w w w . t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w . c o m
Sept10 TR35 p54-63.indd 63
Infected bacterium
Biofilm
Antibiofilm enzyme
energy efficiency by up to 80 percent. Con-
ventional industrial attempts to deal with
biofilms have involved scrubbing pipes,
applying chemicals, or exposing the films
to ultraviolet light, but these treatments are
not very effective, can damage piping, and
are toxic to humans and the environment. A
small injection of phages into a water pipe,
however, could clean an entire system, with
the phages replicating themselves as they
consume the biofilm. —Carl Zimmer
35
35
I nte r n et
Christopher
Kruegel, 34
Developing software that shuts
down botnets
University of California, Santa
Barbara
Botnets—armies of enslaved
computers that have been infected
with carefully crafted worms or
viruses—are responsible for more
than 80 percent of the over 100
billion spam messages e-mailed
daily. Antivirus programs are often
ineffective against them, because
the software typically works by
scanning a computer for signatures
of known viruses—and the viruses
that turn computers into bots are
often too new for these character-
istic patterns to have been identi-
fied. Christopher Kruegel, a security
researcher in the computer sci-
ence department at the University
of California, santa Barbara, has
developed technology that can fer-
ret out an infection even if the virus
or worm has no known signature.
In 2009, he cofounded a startup
called LastLine to commercialize
the technology.
It works by detecting when a
botnet virus is communicating with
its master servers, as it must do
to get its commands or to send
back data—say, your passwords
and credit card numbers. to iden-
tify these communications amid
legitimate network traffic, Kruegel’s
research group analyzed tens of
thousands of malware samples per
day and teased out the command-
and-control messages common to
botnets.
Catching these communica-
tions makes it possible to block the
master servers, forcing criminals to
move their infrastructure or redirect
their communications. In effect,
Kruegel isolates the previously
infected computers, neutralizing
the infection even if it hasn’t been
wiped from your hard drive.
—David Talbot
tr 35 63
8/11/10 5:35 PM
 35
35
S o f t wa r E
Rikin Gandhi, 29
Educating farmers through locally produced video
Digital Green
A
bout 600 million people in india
depend directly on agriculture for their
livelihood. One of the ways the country’s
ministry of agriculture tries to help them
is by broadcasting videos about farming
techniques. in one, for example, officials
describe how to plant a fern called azolla
in otherwise unusable wet spots; it can be
used to make extra cattle feed that enables
cows to give more milk. But partly because
of cultural and ethnic differences between
the ministry workers and the villagers, the
government advice is widely ignored.
Rikin Gandhi, founder of the nonprofit
Digital Green, has developed a pilot project
that offers a solution: simple videos star-
ring local farmers themselves. Gandhi
demonstrated that for every dollar spent,
64 tr 35
Sept10 TR35 p64-74.indd 64
the system persuaded seven times as many
farmers to adopt new ideas as an existing
program of training and visits.
Gandhi—who helped launch the program
as a 2006 project at Microsoft Research,
india—spent six months testing various
video schemes in villages in the state of
Karnataka before concluding that featuring
local farmers was the key. Villagers produce
the videos using handheld camcorders;
workers from partner nongovernmental
organizations then check the quality of the
videos and the accuracy of the advice before
screening them in the villages with hand-
held projectors. So far 500 videos have been
made, but three times that number—which
should reach four times as many villages—
are currently planned. —David Talbot
t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w s e p t e m b e r / o c t o b e r 2010
E n E r gy
Lyndon
Rive, 33
Leasing solar power
SolarCity
What Will it take to get you to
install solar panels on your roof?
lyndon Rive, solar’s master sales-
man, wants to know. thanks to
an innovative leasing program,
among other sales enticements,
SolarCity has become the larg-
est residential solar installer in
the United States. the company,
which is based in Foster City, Ca,
has installed more than 8,000
solar systems since 2006. it tri-
pled in size this year, and Rive, its
CEO and cofounder, expects it to
double next year.
to reduce the high up-front
costs for customers, Rive will
lease homeowners the panels at
a rate based on the size of their
system. as the panels produce
power, surplus electricity is
sold to the local utility, and Rive
says that those sales, combined
with the savings from using less
power from the grid, will typi-
cally reduce the homeowner’s
electric bill by more than enough
to offset the lease payments. he
has hired a team to create soft-
ware that can manage hundreds
of thousands of solar projects in
1,000 jurisdictions, each with its
own particular requirements. By
saving “pennies here and pen-
nies there,” he says, and increas-
ing the volume of installations,
Rive is driving down the costs
of solar power. his hope is that
solar will be able to survive with-
out government subsidies in six
d i g ital g r e e n
to eight years. —Kevin Bullis
8/10/10 11:21 AM
 sitting pretty
Lyndon Rive’s company,
SolarCity, designs and
manufactures the solar
power systems it installs.
j e n S i S ka

Sept10 TR35 p64-74.indd 65 8/10/10 11:21 AM

 35
35

t E l E c o m m u n i cat i o n S

Gabriel
Charlet, 34
Record-breaking
optical fibers for global
communications
Alcatel-Lucent

T
he 2,000 kilometers of fiber-optic
cable stacked in Gabriel Charlet’s lab
in the alcatel-lucent Bell research facil-
ity in Nozay, France, are a reminder of a
record-breaking achievement: in 2009
Charlet smashed the world high-speed
long-distance record for fiber-optic com-
munications, reaching a transmission rate
of 7.2 terabits per second over a single fiber
7,040 kilometers long. that’s around five
times as fast as existing commercial sys-
tems—the equivalent of transmitting more
than 6,000 movie-length DVDs in a minute.
Charlet reinvigorated a field. the data-
carrying capacity of the cables that form
the backbone of the global telecommunica-
tions network had improved little in recent
years: as other researchers tried to boost
transmission rates, microscopic imperfec-
tions in the cables introduced distortions
that could not be compensated for. these
researchers were encoding digital data by
varying the intensity of a pulse of light. For
example, high intensity would represent
a 1 and low intensity would represent a
0. at high data rates over long distances,
the imperfections blurred the distinction
between intensity levels, meaning that at
distances over 7,000 kilometers, around 1.2
terabits per second was the limit of reliable
communication. field of the signal, rather than just its inten- data at 3.2 terabits per second over dis-
to solve the problem, Charlet perfected sity. as a bonus, each pulse of light can now tances of up to 7,000 kilometers (the speeds
a system that uses the polarization and encode four bits of data instead of just one, are slower than Charlet’s record because
phase of a pulse of light, rather than its because different polarizations can be used of the limitations of current chip designs;
intensity, to encode data. Errors induced to indicate different bit values. the next generation will use specially made
by imperfections are far less problem- Drawing on Charlet’s research, alcatel- chips). the next time you watch a video on
bau d o u i n

atic thanks to the development of a new lucent recently launched a new generation Youtube, it may have been piped to you
receiver that detects the whole electrical of commercial equipment that transmits with Charlet’s help. —David Cohen

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A plastic casing
protects this early
prototype for display.
I
SPEEDSTEr Spools containing
thousands of kilometers of fiber-optic
cable let Gabriel Charlet push the bound-
aries of high-speed long-distance data
transmission.
j o S h uA S C ott
w w w . t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w . c o m
Sept10 TR35 p64-74.indd 67
Solid metal casing
E n E r gy
David Bradwell , 28
Cheap, reliable batteries to store renewable energy
MIT
n the fall of 2007, David Bradwell, an MIT
grad student, created a new kind of bat-
tery—one that might eventually be used to
store massive amounts of solar and wind
energy for use at night or when the wind
isn’t blowing. Unlike existing batteries,
it has active components that are liquid,
which enables it to handle high currents
without fracturing (the battery is kept at
700 °C with the help of insulation). Last
year Bradwell’s research attracted a total
of about $11 million from the U.S. Depart-
ment of Energy’s new Advanced Research
Projects Agency–Energy (ARPA-E) and the
French oil company Total.
Bradwell’s battery is based on an elec-
trolyte that can dissolve a compound con-
sisting of two metals, such as magnesium
and antimony. Applying a current in one
Magnesium
electrode
Electrolyte
Antimony
electrode
LiquiD BaTTEry An early proto-
type battery has been sawed in half to
reveal its electrodes and electrolyte,
which are liquid during operation.
direction splits the compound, and the two
metals are deposited onto opposite elec-
trodes. When no electricity is delivered, a
voltage difference between the electrodes
drives a current in the other direction. That
generates electricity and causes the metals
to recombine in the electrolyte.
The system could eventually cost less
than $100 per kilowatt-hour for a new
installation—about the same as pump-
ing water up a hill to be released later to
spin a turbine (the cheapest conventional
approach for large-scale energy stor-
age), says Arun Majumdar, the director
of ARPA-E. The battery, however, would
have the advantage of working in places
without hills or large amounts of water,
where many renewable power resources
are located. —Kevin Bullis
tr 35 67
8/11/10 1:16 PM
 this mouse has a genetic Four master genes
defect that causes sickle- are inserted into the
cell anemia. skin cells.
Some skin cells are
taken from the mouse.

S o f t wa r E

Kim
Hazelwood, 34
Reëngineering
software on the fly
University of Virginia

iMaGiNE having a team of

mechanics pull apart and retune
the stem cells are your car’s engine as you hur-
tle down the highway, without
injected back into the
mouse, curing it of the
disease. making the engine miss a stroke.
that’s the nature of the challenge
that motivates Kim hazelwood,
an assistant professor of computer
science, who has created tools to
the iPS cells are
turned into blood the master rewrite software as a computer is
genes reprogram
stem cells.
the skin cells to executing it. Before she started
become iPS cells.
working on the problem in grad
school, “i would have said there’s
the genetic defect that
causes sickle-cell anemia no way you can just take programs
B i ot E c h n o lo gy
and change them and have every
Jacob Hanna, 30
is repaired.

program work,” says hazelwood.

But industry giants like intel and
Reprogramming cells to cure diseases researchers around the world
Whitehead Institute
have used her subsequent achieve-
ments to do just that.

M
hazelwood’s approach contra-
ere months after Kyoto University researchers announced in 2007 that they had
dicts one of the most important
discovered how to turn skin cells into induced pluripotent stem cells (iPS cells),
notions in computer program-
Jacob hanna used these new types of cells to cure mice of sickle-cell anemia, in which a ming—abstraction. abstraction
genetic defect causes bone marrow to make defective red blood cells. hanna, a fellow at means that software is built in
the Whitehead institute, took skin cells from a diseased mouse and reprogrammed them layers: an application runs on top
to create iPS cells, which behave like embryonic stem cells, readily turning into any cell of an operating system, which
type in the body. he then corrected the genetic defect and prodded the iPS cells to develop runs on top of the hardware. Each
into the type of marrow stem cell that manufactures a mouse’s blood cells. these healthy layer does its best to conceal its
cells were transplanted back into the mouse, whose immune system accepted them as the inner workings. that way, some-
animal’s own tissue. the treated mouse began producing healthy red blood cells on its own. one writing, say, a Web browser
hanna’s work was a turning point for iPS research, says George Daley, director of the doesn’t have to know all the engi-
Stem Cell transplantation Program at Boston’s Children’s hospital and a professor at neering that went into a proces-
harvard Medical School: “it was a beautiful demonstration of a mouse model of a human sor. at times, however, it would
disease, and really demonstrated the potential of iPS cells.” be useful for the application and
Before iPS cells can be used to treat diseases such as sickle-cell anemia in humans, a lot hardware layers to communicate
b ryan C h r i Sti e d e S i g n

of work has to be done to make sure they won’t cause adverse side effects and to improve more directly. For example, some
the efficiency of deriving them from skin cells. hanna is now developing simulations to modern processors reduce elec-
understand what happens when cells are reprogrammed, and he’s searching for new types tricity consumption by turning off
of human stem cells that could be easier to turn into adult cells. —Nidhi Subbaraman portions of the chip until they are

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 35
35

T r a n S P o r TaT i o n

Jochen Mundinger, 32
reducing the carbon footprint of travel
RouteRank

FruStrAtEd by trying to coördinate different

modes of transport to get from Switzerland to
a conference in poland four years ago, jochen
Mundinger had an idea for a search engine
5:52
London Car, plane, car
that would find the fastest, cheapest, or most
to Munich
ecological
Train, plane, train way to getfrom
6:21A to B. Mathemati-
cally, what’s involved is a network optimization
problem under a particular set of constraints—a
Marseille Car, plane, car
to Warsaw perfect fit for Mundinger, who was trained as a 6:57
network analyst and works at the Swiss Federal
8:26
Train, plane, bus
institute of technology in lausanne. in 2007, he
turned the idea into a company, routerank.
Geneva Car, plane, cartype in, say,“Basel”
5:16 and “Munich” in
to Rome routerank and the system will find not only
Train  7:31 but also trains, public transport, and
flights
driving routes—and let you combine them. A
0 50 100 150 200 250 300 350
C0 2 (kg)

go grEEn
Being flexible with travel plans can mean signifi-
cant reductions in carbon emissions.

London Car, plane, car 5:52

to Munich
Train, plane, train 6:21

Marseille Car, plane, car 6:57

to Warsaw
Train, plane, bus 8:26
Geneva Car, plane, car 5:16
to Rome
Train 7:31
0 50 100 150 200 250 300 350
C0 2 (kg)

ThE rEProgrammEr Kim hazelwood’s technology allows computers to adjust

software so it works better with the hardware it's running on.
needed, but an application that
causes this to happen excessively
can shorten the life of the chip.
Hazelwood’s software can moni-
tor the processor and detect when
subsystems are being turned off
and on too often. It then analyzes
the software instructions that are
E li M E i r KAp lAn
The ability to monitor and
modify applications while
they’re running could be widely
useful. For example, it could
make it easier to compensate for
hardware bugs, divide tasks
among multiple processors, run
software on different processor
click of your mouse lets you sort the results
according to what you consider most important,
whether that’s price, travel time, or environmen-
tal considerations. routerank calculates the
carbon dioxide emissions associated with each
itinerary and lets you offset them by connecting
you to Myclimate, a Swiss-based nonprofit
foundation. today routerank provides
customized commercial service to nokia, the
conservation group WWF, and, most recently,
the Swiss government. one surprising discovery,
says Mundinger, is that the fastest way of

triggering the problem and sub- architectures, and even defend getting somewhere isn’t always the least green.
stitutes more hardware-friendly against malicious software. next steps include expanding beyond Europe.
commands that do the same job. —Stephen Cass —Giselle Weiss

w w w . t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w . c o m tr 35 69

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 35
35

S o f T wa r E

Andrey
Rybalchenko, 32
Stopping software from
getting stuck in loops
University of Technology, Munich

CoMputEr scientist Andrey

rybalchenko has developed a new
method for finding software bugs.
traditional automated testing sys-
tems detect when programs do
“bad things” that lead to crashes,
forcing the program to quit. By
focusing on crashes, however, such
testing often misses a significant
class of bugs—those that allow
the software to keep running but
leave it unable to accept new input
or do anything useful. in essence,
rybalchenko instead tries to iden-
tify when a program is doing “good
things,” such as making progress
through loops or responding to
other programs.
in a collaboration with Microsoft E n E r gy

Peter Meinhold, 34
that began in 2006, rybalchenko
incorporated his methods into

Engineering a better bug for biofuels

terminator, a commercial program
used to find bugs in the device driv-
ers that mediate between an oper- Gevo
ating system and various pieces of
hardware. Countless device drivers

have been created by third-party
developers, and they are often
responsible for software failures
that users blame on the oS. So
detecting these bugs improves both
actual and perceived oS reliability.
rybalchenko is currently seek-
ing ways to detect similar bugs that
can appear when many processors
work simultaneously on the same
task but fail to coördinate properly
and begin competing instead. now
that processor speed has plateaued
at a little over three gigahertz, this
kind of problem will become more
and more significant as manufac-
turers turn to multicore systems to
continue improving performance.
A
s a biofuel, ethanol is relatively easy to make, but it has a lower energy density than
gasoline and can’t be transported through existing pipelines designed for petroleum
fuels. Isobutanol, however, can be sent through these pipelines, and its energy density
is close to that of gasoline. It can also be turned into jet fuel, and it can be used as a raw
material for the manufacture of plastics and many other chemicals normally derived
from petroleum.
Both ethanol and isobutanol are made from sugars produced by breaking down bio-
mass. But it’s not easy to produce isobutanol with the help of microbes like the ones that
ferment those sugars into ethanol. So Peter Meinhold rewired the yeast genome, replac-
ing genes that controlled ethanol fermentation with genes for a enzymatic pathway that
would produce isobutanol. He cofounded Gevo in 2005 to commercialize the technol-
ogy and produce isobutanol that would be cost-competitive with petroleum-based fuels.
Gevo has also enhanced the isobutanol-producing capacity of its yeast by developing a
system that continously removes isobutanol as it is produced. (Otherwise, high concen-
trations of isobutanol would inhibit the growth of the yeast.) The company is also devel-
oping new versions of the yeast that can feed on sugars produced from grasses and wood
C o u rtE Sy o F G Evo

—Giselle Weiss
chips. In 2009, Gevo announced the startup of a million-gallon-per-year demonstration
facility retrofitted into an ethanol plant. The company has set a goal of going to market
by 2012. —Nidhi Subbaraman

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 B i oT E c h n o Lo gy developing a version of the device that

Philip Low, 31 gathers data and beams it to a subject’s cell

phone, which can then send it wirelessly
Liberating patients from sleep clinics to NeuroVigil for analysis.
NeuroVigil Pharmaceutical companies use the
device to watch for brain-related side
effects when testing therapies for dis-

T
he study of sleep has been a cumbersome
affair. Test subjects must spend the night
on a laboratory bed, hooked to machines by
over a dozen leads. The next day, a techni-
cian scores the machines’ output by hand,
categorizing each 30-second interval by
stage of the sleep cycle.
Philip Low, seeking a better way, cre-
ated an algorithm that can classify sleep
stages using data from just a single LED
lead. In 2007 he founded NeuroVigil, a
startup based in La Jolla, CA, that manu-
factures a sleep-monitoring device based
on the technology.
The device is small enough to be worn
on a headband, so subjects can sleep at
home rather than at a clinic. To make life
even easier for subjects, the company is
orders of the central nervous system.
NeuroVigil has used these trials to amass
a database of readings from patients with
particular diseases. Low hopes that by
mining this database, he will discover EEG
signatures in the data that might warn of
conditions like Alzheimer’s, schizophre-
nia, or Parkinson’s before symptoms
appear. —Jocelyn Rice

DrEamcaTchEr Modeled by
the iBrain device is philip low, this version of neurovigil’s
small enough to be iBrain records EEG data and trans-
worn on the head.
mits it to the company by phone.

A cell phone can relay

EEG data to neurovigil this prototype uses
for analysis. off-the-shelf Bluetooth
transmitters to send
data to a cell phone.
M i S hA G rAvE n o r

w w w . t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w . c o m feature story 71

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 35
35
T E L E c o m m u n i caT i o n S
Ranveer Chandra, 34
Delivering high-speed wireless Internet connections
over longer distances
Microsoft Research
P
ROBLEM: Wi-Fi uses frequencies that
can’t carry a signal more than a few tens of
meters. TV stations, on the other hand, use a
portion of the radio spectrum that lets signals
travel long distances, and the end of analog tele-
vision has opened up unused slices of the spec-
trum between stations. They could be used for
wireless Internet service, but it has been diffi-
cult to take advantage of these so-called white
spaces without causing interference, because
the exact frequencies used by TV stations vary
geographically.
SOLUTION: Ranveer Chandra made the
Microsoft campus in Redmond, WA, his labo-
ratory for the first large-scale network to dem-
onstrate the potential of using white spaces to
deliver broadband wireless. Links in the proto-
Mhz 512 518 524 530 536 542
(B)
Mhz 512 518 524 530 536 542
(A)
72 tr 35
Sept10 TR35 p64-74.indd 72
m aT E r i a LS
Alán Aspuru-
Guzik, 34
Simulating chemistry
with quantum computers
Harvard
in thEory, quantum
mechanics should offer per-
type network can span up to two kilometers. To fect understanding of some
avoid treading on the toes of TV broadcasters, of the most interesting events
his system uses GPS to determine its location; in chemistry—for example,
then it checks the Web to find out what stations the behavior of excited elec-
are active in the area. Chandra’s devices can also trons, which controls such
things as photosynthesis in
listen for nearby transmissions from wireless
plants. in practice, however,
microphones, which use the same bands. When a the necessary calculations
conflict is detected, they switch to a backup slice are far too difficult for even
of unused spectrum on the fly. the most powerful computers.
If such a system gains currency, “all of us So approximations must be
should be connected and better connected, and made, especially when larger
molecules such as proteins
not just here in the U.S.,” says Chandra. Spec-
are involved.
trum regulators from Singapore, India, Brazil, Alán Aspuru-Guzik, a theo-
and China have all come to visit his prototype retical chemist at harvard,
network to explore the potential for white- is developing methods that
space signals to connect large rural areas with could one day do away with
minimal infrastructure. —Tom Simonite the need for approximations
altogether—and lead to bet-
ter drugs or solar cells.
he has created an algo-
rithm that allows quantum
computers to simulate chem-
istry with a level of accuracy
Mhz 512 518 524 530 536 542 that traditional computers
will never be able to match.
Although quantum com-
puters are not yet power-
ful enough to simulate the
behavior of large molecules,
(C) Aspuru-Guzik and collabora-
tors in Australia, working with
an experimental quantum
computer, successfully used
the algorithm to compute
the energy of the hydrogen
molecule.
Aspuru-Guzik is also prob-
ing the quantum effects at
the heart of photosynthesis
in the hopes of developing
SELf-awarE to avoid interference,
cheaper and more efficient
a base station checks the Web and
finds out which frequency bands are organic photovoltaics.
–Neil Savage
E M i ly C o o p E r
in use by local tv stations (A). it also
listens for any wireless microphones in
range (B) and picks a free band (C).
t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w s e p t e m b e r / o c t o b e r 2010
8/11/10 1:16 PM
 15th Annual MITX Interactive Awards
Copley Marriott, Boston, MA
Thursday, November 18, 2010

You’re invited to join over 1,000 digital marketing, technology, and

media professionals to celebrate the best creative and technological
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Tickets on sale this October at www.mitxawards.org/interactive

Time: 6:00pm — 9:00pm

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MITX_TR1010.indd 1 8/5/10 2:42 PM
 35
35

m aT E r i a LS

Conor Madigan, 32
Bringing down the price of
OLED displays
Kateeva

T
elevision displays based on organic light-
emitting diodes are brighter, crisper, and
more energy efficient than liquid-crystal dis-
plays. But they’re very expensive, especially
for large-screen models. Conor Madigan is
working to drive down the cost of these dis-
plays as the CEO and cofounder of a Silicon
Valley startup called Kateeva, which is develop-
ing efficient machinery for printing pixels over
large areas. The technology makes it possible
to manufacture OLED screens at 60 percent
of the cost of LCD screens.
Kateeva is sending out a beta version of
its OLED-display printers to customers for
evaluation in the first half of 2011 and hopes
to have its first production tools on the mar-
ket in 2012. If OLEDs replace LCDs, Kateeva
could tap into a $10-billion-a-year market for
display-manufacturing equipment.
—Katherine Bourzac

S o f T wa r E worDLESS Medhi’s interfaces

Indrani Medhi, 32 guide illiterate and semiliterate

users through tasks such as elec-
Building interfaces tronic banking.
for the illiterate
Microsoft Research India

inForMAtion is at the finger- the key to overcoming this

tips of anyone with access to a
laptop or smart phone. But what
if the user is one of the 774 mil-
lion adults worldwide who cannot
read? this is the problem that
obsesses indrani Medhi. Based
at Microsoft research india’s
Bangalore lab, she has conducted
field research in india, South
Africa, and the philippines to
design text-free interfaces that
could help illiterate and semiliter-
ate people find jobs, get medical
information, and use cell-phone-
based banking services.
Meaningful computer icons
are rarely the same from one
culture to another, Medhi says,
so she used symbols, audio cues,
and cartoons that are specific to
particular poor communities. But
then she encountered another
hurdle. Even when users became
familiar with the hardware and the
interfaces, Medhi realized, they
still did not fully understand how
information relevant to their lives
could possibly be contained in or
delivered by a computer.
problem, she discovered, is to
j E n S i S KA (MAd i GAn); i n d rAn i M E d h i / M i C r o S o Ft r E S EAr C h i n d iA
offer a five-minute video drama-
tization when an application is
launched, illustrating exactly how
it is supposed to work. For exam-
ple, the one that accompanies her
job-search interface features an
upper-middle-class couple that
needs a domestic helper. the hus-
band posts the requirements to a
job website that is subsequently
accessed by unemployed and illit-
erate women at a community cen-
ter. the video ends with a woman
being hired. –Guy Gugliotta

74 tr 35 t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w s e p t e m b e r / o c t o b e r 2010

Sept10 TR35 p64-74.indd 74 8/11/10 1:16 PM

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A Family Mystery,
Solved by a Genome
Physicians can now use DNA sequencing to
uncover the causes of rare genetic disorders.
M
ore than a dozen people who have had their genomes
sequenced stand on stage in an R&D center near
Boston. Billed as the last time all such people might
fit in one room before the technology moves into
the mainstream, the event doesn’t quite include the whole group:
actress Glenn Close and South African archbishop Desmond Tutu,
among others, didn’t make it. But those who did include James
Watson, codiscoverer of the structure of DNA; Harvard historian
Henry Louis Gates Jr.; entrepreneur Esther Dyson; and a smat-
tering of leaders from gene-sequencing companies.
Leaning against a wall at one end of the stage is James Lupski, a
pediatrician, clinical geneticist, and scientist at Baylor College of
Medicine. Unlike many of the others, Lupski wasn’t interested in
sequencing as a way to trace his ancestry or determine his future
likelihood of developing some ailment. Instead, he had hoped
to solve a medical mystery that affects him in the most personal
way: the cause of a genetic disorder, called Charcot-Marie-Tooth
disease, that struck him and several of his siblings as teenagers,
severely weakening the muscles in their legs and feet. After a
quarter-century searching for the gene responsible, the 53-year-
old scientist finally found it by scouring his own genome, comb-
ing through the billions of DNA building blocks represented by
the letters A, T, C, and G. It marks the very first time that whole-
76 feature story
Sept10 Feature Genome.indd 76
By E MILy SING E R
genome sequencing—determining the exact order of all the letters
in an individual’s DNA—has identified the mutation to blame for
a specific case of a genetic disease.
Since the human genome was first sequenced a decade ago,
scientists have discovered thousands of genetic variations linked
to different diseases. Until very recently, however, sequencing an
individual genome cost millions of dollars, making it an imprac-
tical way to search for the cause of a particular person’s genetic
disorder. Now the cost of sequencing has fallen so dramatically
that it’s becoming realistic to do just that. A genetic test for inher-
ited nerve diseases, which costs about $15,000, screens for only
a limited number of genes. But now sequencing is available to
consumers for $20,000 and provides the entirety of a person’s
genetic information. Searching through it can reveal genes and
pathways whose role in a disorder scientists may never have sus-
pected. This could help illuminate the more than a thousand rare
genetic disorders for which scientists have been unable to pinpoint
a specific culprit. And it could contribute to a new way of thinking
about the role heredity plays in many common ailments, such as
diabetes and Alzheimer’s.
In Lupski’s view, the frontiers opened by whole-genome
sequencing will be to traditional Mendelian genetics what
Einstein’s discoveries were to Newtonian mechanics. “Newton
Photographs by MAT T HE W RAINWAT E RS
8/10/10 6:29 PM
 family traits After
sequencing his genome,
James Lupski discovered
the mutations that led him
and three of his siblings
to develop a neurological
disorder.

w w w . t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w . c o m feature story 77

Sept10 Feature Genome.indd 77 8/10/10 6:29 PM

 wasn’t wrong,” he says. “We were just expanding our understand-
ing to include relativity.” Mendel wasn’t wrong either: single genes
and certain diseases do follow Mendelian patterns of inheritance.
But, he says, “there are genetic modifiers and new mutations that
‘Mendelism’ perhaps did not anticipate.” Just as Newtonian phys-
ics is a special case of Einsteinian relativity, Mendelian inheri-
tance is one piece of a more complete picture that will be revealed
in the genome.
To bring that picture into better focus, Lupski is now sequenc-
ing the genomes of several patients with rare neurological dis-
orders of unknown cause. The results are unlikely to have much
immediate impact on their care: there are no effective treatments
for their diseases right now. But the technology could offer new
insight into those diseases and guide the way to future therapies.
The hunT
At Baylor’s campus in Houston, the Human Genome Sequencing
Center spans three floors of the building next to Lupski’s office.
The center, one of three nationally funded labs in the United
States, became a key player in the Human Genome Project in
the late 1990s. In 2007, its director, Richard Gibbs, invited Lupski
to help sequence the genome of James Watson. The high-profile
project, completed later that year, was a technical accomplish-
ment because it employed a new generation of cheap sequenc-
ing technologies. But it also highlighted the limitations of the
approach: they’d identified mutations in genes whose function
78 feature story
Sept10 Feature Genome.indd 78
a catalogue of genetic mistakes James Lupski has spent
the last 25 years searching for the genetic basis of a number of inherited
disorders. The bookshelves of his Baylor office are filled with data on dif-
ferent mutations.
they knew little about. What’s more, Watson had no diseases that
the researchers could try to trace to a gene. So Gibbs offered to
sequence Lupski’s genome.
When Lupski was first diagnosed with Charcot-Marie-Tooth
as an adolescent in New york in the 1960s, the tools of human
genetics were still rudimentary, and no disease genes had yet been
identified. Physicians relied on particular symptoms and patterns
of family inheritance to diagnose genetic disorders. In Lupski’s
case, three of his seven siblings developed muscular symptoms
similar to his own, suggesting that they were suffering from a
recessive genetic disease. The affected siblings had apparently
inherited two mutant copies of an unknown gene, one from their
mother and one from their father.
In 1983, while studying for both a medical degree and a PhD
at New york University, Lupski picked up a copy of the journal
Nature in which geneticists reported for the first time that they
had identified the approximate location of a gene responsible
for a human disease, in this case the neurological disorder Hun-
tington’s disease. (It would take another decade to find the gene
within the target region.) Lupski decided that he could follow
the example of the Huntington’s researchers, who had studied
t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w s e p t e m b e r / o c t o b e r 2010
8/9/10 2:09 PM
 large families in which the disease was prevalent, to search for the
genetic cause of his own disorder. That decision, which he now
laughs off as naïve, would trigger a decades-long quest.
The strategy that Lupski and other gene hunters used in the
1980s was to build large family trees of relatives afflicted with a
disorder. The scientists would then screen family members’ DNA
for genetic markers—specific sequences, found at spots on the
genome known to vary from person to person—present only in
those with the disease. If all the affected family members car-
ried a particular marker and none of the unaffected family mem-
bers did, the researchers hypothesized that the disease-causing
variation was somewhere near that marker. Scientists needed to
study large families in order to rule out markers that were inher-
ited in this pattern by chance; the more subjects in a sample, the
easier it is to distinguish a relevant signal from genetic noise.
Large families were especially important in studying diseases
like Charcot-Marie-Tooth, which has such variable symptoms
that individual cases can be misdiagnosed. Once they had identi-
As more people have their
genomes sequenced, it’s be-
coming clear that Mendelian
genetics isn’t so black and
white. Genetic variations once
thought to follow Mendelian
rules may behave in more
subtle and complicated ways.
fied a likely marker, scientists would laboriously sift through the
DNA in that area of the genome, looking for candidate genes and
mutations in them.
Lupski’s efforts paid off in 1991, when he and his coworkers
discovered the first genetic variation linked to Charcot-Marie-
Tooth. A gene on chromosome 17, at a spot involved in produc-
ing the fatty insulation that covers nerve fibers, turned out to be
duplicated in some people with the disorder. It was the first time
a disease had been linked to a variation in the structure of DNA,
rather than to a change in a single letter or some other simple
alteration in sequence. (These mutations, now known as copy-
number variations, have since been implicated in a wide array of
diseases, including schizophrenia and autism.)
Over the next 17 years, Lupski’s lab would identify a number
of other genetic variations tied to the disease. yet Lupski never
found any of the newly discovered mutations in his own DNA.
w w w . t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w . c o m
Sept10 Feature Genome.indd 79
Then in 2008 came Gibbs’s offer—an opportunity to examine every
gene simultaneously. After Lupski and his team sifted through
the roughly 90 gigabases of raw data generated by sequencing
his genome, they identified approximately three million spots
where his DNA differed from the reference sequence created by
the Human Genome Project. They homed in on those variations
found only in genes previously linked to Charcot-Marie-Tooth
or other nerve disorders.
Finally, they found two mutations in a gene called SH3TC2,
one inherited from each parent. With that anomaly in sight, the
researchers defrosted a set of DNA samples that Lupski had col-
lected 25 years earlier and sequenced the gene in his siblings, his
parents, and his late grandparents. He and all of his affected sib-
lings turned out to carry both mutations, while the unaffected
family members carried either one or none.
Mendel Revisited
The variant of Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease that Lupski suffers
from is a Mendelian disorder, meaning that it is caused by muta-
tions in a single gene. (Many other diseases—typically more com-
mon ones, such as diabetes and heart disease—are triggered by
a combination of complex genetic and environmental factors.)
Some Mendelian diseases, known as dominant disorders, affect
people who inherit just one copy of the mutant gene. For so-called
recessive diseases, such as Lupski’s, it takes two defective copies to
do the damage. This concept has dominated the study of human
genetics for decades. But as more people have their genomes
sequenced, and researchers and physicians begin to look more
closely at the genes linked to specific disorders, it’s becoming clear
that Mendelian genetics isn’t black and white. Genetic variations
once thought to follow Mendelian rules may in fact behave in a
more subtle and complicated way.
For instance, analysis has revealed that Lupski carries two cop-
ies of mutations in each of four genes linked to other Mendelian
disorders. According to traditional thinking, he should suffer
from all four. But he does not. The findings may turn out to be
an error in sequencing, but more likely, they suggest that these
mutations don’t work the way researchers have assumed. Now
the researchers are being forced to conclude that mutations in
genes linked to Mendelian diseases don’t always guarantee those
disorders.
It’s also turning out that carriers of recessive diseases—those
who have inherited a single copy of the disease-linked muta-
tion—may not be wholly unscathed, as Mendelian theory says
they should be. Previous studies have shown that people with a
single copy of the defective gene that causes cystic fibrosis are
more likely than people with two copies of the normal gene to
suffer from chronic sinusitis and pancreatitis. The DNA from
Lupski’s family fits a similar pattern.
feature story 79
8/10/10 6:29 PM
 Twenty years ago, when he was collecting the family DNA sam-
ples, Lupski had his relatives undergo a common test for neuro-
logical disease in which physicians attach electrodes to the upper
arm and measure the speed of an electrical signal sent down to the
wrist. Thanks to his new genetic insights, Lupski now realizes that
this test revealed nerve impairment in siblings who did not have
Charcot-Marie-Tooth but had inherited a single defective gene
from their mother. This type of dysfunction is linked to carpal
tunnel syndrome, a common disorder often caused by repetitive
hand movements. The findings hint that a single mutant copy of
this gene makes people more susceptible.
If the variant is indeed linked to carpal tunnel syndrome, it
probably explains only a tiny percentage of cases; the genetic
defect involved in the Lupskis’ disease is rare. But the finding illus-
trates how studies of rare genetic diseases may also shed light on
more common ones. Perhaps a number of different mutations,
each one rare on its own, can all give rise to the set of relatively
common symptoms that characterize carpal tunnel syndrome.
This notion falls in line with a shift in thinking among geneti-
cists. Until recently, the role of genes in common diseases like
Alzheimer’s and type 2 diabetes was thought to be very different
from the one they play in Mendelian diseases. The predominant
theory was that these disorders were triggered by a number of
common genetic variations, each individually exerting a relatively
minor effect. Over the last five years, scientists have used microar-
ray chips designed to quickly and cheaply detect a million or more
of the most common genetic variations in hundreds of thousands
of people with a variety of diseases.
But the effort has failed to identify most of the genetic basis
for many diseases. So scientists are increasingly concluding that
the common-variant hypothesis is wrong, and that rare variants
play an important role in common diseases. If so, the best way for
scientists to understand the genetics of common diseases will be
to take the same approach they are now using to study rare disor-
ders. They will need to sequence the entire genomes of patients
and their families.
BetteR Medicine
On the second Tuesday of every month, Lupski meets with other
clinical geneticists at Baylor to discuss challenging cases. Short
video clips of children with a range of strange and disturbing dis-
orders are projected on a screen in the front of the room. One boy
has widely set eyes, each a different color, and hearing loss in one
ear. One toddler won’t put anything in his mouth and must use a
gastric feeding tube. Three brothers suffer from mental retarda-
tion of unknown cause. For parents whose children’s mysterious
disorders haven’t been identified by traditional genetic testing,
genome sequencing might finally bring a diagnosis, and years of
medical testing could come to an end.
80 feature story
Sept10 Feature Genome.indd 80
In a few lucky cases, it could lead to treatment. Last year,
researchers at yale University probably saved the life of a five-
month-old infant in Turkey who’d been admitted to the hospi-
tal with the catch-all diagnosis of “failure to thrive.” Physicians
suspected a kidney disorder. But by sequencing his exome, the
portion of the genome that codes for proteins, researchers dis-
covered a genetic mutation linked to congenital chloride diar-
rhea. This rare disorder can be treated by simply replacing the
body’s lost salt.
In most cases, we’re still years away from cures or drugs for the
genetic disorders uncovered by sequencing. Still, understanding
the genetic causes of a disease is a first step to identifying its molec-
ular mechanisms, which in turn will help researchers develop
treatments. And sequencing can greatly speed up the search for
disease genes. Once Lupski identified the first genetic variation
for Charcot-Marie-Tooth in 1991, researchers used genetic engi-
The best way for scientists to
understand the genetics of
common disease will be to
take the same approach they
are now using to study rare
disorders. They will need to
sequence the entire genomes
of patients and their families.
neering to re-create that mutation in mice and then used those
animals to test potential treatments. A drug that emerged from
this research is now in clinical trials for Charcot-Marie-Tooth
patients who have the duplication that Lupski discovered (it turns
out that about 70 percent of sufferers do). He hopes this success
can be repeated for rarer disease-linked variations like his own.
Another lab has already developed a mouse with a mutation in
the SH3TC2 gene.
As the price of sequencing continues to plummet, Lupski
believes, genetically guided diagnosis will spur a major transi-
tion in medicine by helping to spotlight the complex genetics
behind both rare and common diseases.
“At one point, if you had a cough, the doctor said you had
pneumonia,” he says. “Now we can distinguish between bacte-
rial and viral pneumonias, and prescribe the right drug for the
right type.”
Emily singEr is Technology Review’s sEnior Editor for biomEdicinE.
t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w s e p t e m b e r / o c t o b e r 2010
8/10/10 6:29 PM
Cleve_TR1010.indd 1 8/2/10 1:38 PM
 Christopher “moot” Poole created
4chan, an online community where
people are free to be wrong. Now big
investors want a piece of his ideas.
Radical Opacity
By J u L i A N Di B B eL L
C
hristopher Poole is 22 years old, and as is often true for
men his age, his mental life has been punctuated by
a series of passing enthusiasms: video games, online
chat rooms, Japanese animation. Currently he seems
to be going through a Robert Moses phase. On the nightstand in
his New York City apartment is a copy of The Power Broker: Robert
Moses and the Fall of New York, a 1,300-page biography of the mid-
20th-century urban planner who, in pursuing his vision of a mod-
ernized New York, destroyed one neighborhood after another. A
book of photos on Poole’s coffee table documents the Moses-era
demolition of midtown Manhattan’s vast and graceful old Penn
Station. (“Gut-wrenching,” says Poole.) And on a recent Thursday
afternoon, as he walked to work past Washington Square Park and
observed the sweeping renovations under way there—a controver-
sial relandscaping imposed by current city planners in the face of
heavy local opposition—he saw parallels with the old autocrat’s
imperious approach to such projects. “Robert Moses is probably
smiling,” he said. “Like, ‘Fuck the people—what do they know!’ ”
Like many people, Poole thinks there are better ways than
Moses’s to manage the tangled social, cultural, and infrastruc-
tural needs of a community of millions. But unlike most people—let
alone most 22-year-olds—he actually has some experience doing
just that. Seven years ago, Poole created the website 4chan, an
online community that now has nearly 11 million monthly users
and is, in some respects, as unruly as any metropolis. The site is
what’s known as an image board, a type of online message forum
that encourages users to post both images and text, and its users
now contribute more than a million messages a day, their content
tending in the aggregate toward a unique mix of humor, pornog-
82 feature story
Sept10 Feature Moot.indd 82
raphy, offensiveness, and, at times, borderline legality. it has long
been one of the largest message forums in the world, but Poole, the
only owner 4chan has ever had, continues to run it as he has always
done: in his spare time, with a little help from online volunteers
and just enough advertising revenue to cover bandwidth costs.
Visited mostly by young men in their late teens and early 20s,
4chan is loosely organized by topics of interest—music, games, TV,
animation (Japanese and otherwise). But nearly half its messages
are posted in a single random-topics section known as /b/, and
/b/’s anarchy sets the tone for the site in general. it’s out of /b/ that
swarms of gleeful online troublemakers—trolls, in internet par-
lance—occasionally issue forth to prank, hack, harass, and other-
wise digitally provoke other online communities and users. From
/b/, as well, the internet at large absorbs a steady stream of catch-
phrases and sight gags—LOLcats, rickrolling, and other ubiquitous
internet memes that seep up from the endless, dizzying churn of
/b/’s vast reservoir of inside jokes. Often intended to shock, shot
through with racism, misogyny, and other qualities deliberately
chosen from beyond the contemporary pale, the words and images
of /b/ have become an online spectacle: “Lunatic, juvenile ... brilliant,
ridiculous and alarming,” the Guardian newspaper’s website once
called it. “The id of the internet,” it has been called more than once.
By no coincidence, 4chan stands out not only for the content
its users generate but for the way they generate it: with a degree of
anonymity almost unheard-of in the online world. Though Poole
himself is known to the site’s users by the cryptic pseudonym
“moot,” on 4chan even using a pseudonym is rare. The site has no
log-in function, so each message can be posted under whatever
name its author chooses, but users are strongly encouraged to
Photographs by J ORDAN h O L L e NDe R
8/11/10 9:56 AM
 In SHADOWS
Christopher Poole is
the creator of 4chan, an
online message board
where anonymity reigns.

w w w . t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w . c o m feature story 83

Sept10 Feature Moot.indd 83 8/11/10 9:56 AM

 post with no identifying name at all. Roughly 90 percent of all
messages on 4chan are posted under the site’s default identity,
“Anonymous.” And those messages are not only anonymous but
ephemeral, because 4chan has no long-term archives: old mes-
sage threads are automatically deleted when new ones need the
room. This mechanism was originally meant to save storage costs,
but as Poole notes, “it’s both practical and philosophical.” Among
other things, it challenges the idea that digital identity should
follow you across time, linking what you say when you’re a teen-
ager to the middle-aged business owner you might become. In
4chan’s heavy traffic, a message can vanish within hours or even
minutes of its posting.
As approaches to community management go, this is pretty
much the opposite of what the mainstream Internet seems headed
toward. Anonymity, once thought to be a defining attribute of
online interaction, is nowadays widely approached as a bug to
be fixed. Managers of newspapers’ online comment sections in
particular have grown wary of it, blaming the irresponsible men-
tality of anonymous commenters for bitter flame wars and ram-
bling digressions. Several newspaper sites have lately closed their
comment sections to anonymous posting altogether, and at least
one now requires commenters to post under their own verified
credit-card billing names. But the clearest demonstration of the
Internet’s move away from anonymity has been the rise of social-
networking sites like Facebook, whose appeal to both users and
marketers rests on a closing of the gap between online and offline
identities. Facebook’s 26-year-old CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, seems
to be an unusually fervent believer in the virtues of “radical trans-
parency” in online dealings—he famously once told an interviewer
that “having two identities for yourself is an example of a lack of
integrity”—but he is not alone among the Silicon Valley elite in
linking the decline of anonymity to the promise of a more toler-
ant, peaceful, and profitable digital world.
Yet many, even among that same Silicon Valley elite, have found
reasons to regret the loss of anonymity online. Poole’s selection as
a speaker at the technology world’s invitation-only TED confer-
ence last February provided him with an opportunity to express
those reservations. Standing in sneakers and a zippered hoodie
on the expensively designed TED stage (the same one Bill Gates
would be speaking from the next day), Poole gave a brief talk that
was as thoughtful and polite as 4chan can be rude and unhinged,
and he made a compelling case for the anonymity that helps make
4chan what it is. Support for anonymous communication often
comes down to a standard set of arguments: people should have
a place where they can speak truth to power (blow a whistle on
corruption, assess whether an emperor has clothes) without fear
of reprisal; they should also have a place where they can be true to
themselves (explore an unconventional sexuality, seek treatment
for a stigmatized disease) without risking ostracism and worse. But
84 feature story
Sept10 Feature Moot.indd 84
while Poole embraces these arguments, what he says in defense
of the anonymity on 4chan is at once less high-minded and (in
ways he is only slowly coming to understand) more far-reaching:
“People deserve a place to be wrong.”
MEME FACTORY
Poole didn’t particularly want 4chan to be anonymous when he
started it. He was 15, an only child of divorced parents, living with
his mother in a Westchester County suburb of New York City and
gripped by a midadolescent fascination with Japanese animation,
or anime. That had led him to a good place to find anime images:
the Futaba Channel, a popular Japanese image board also known
to its English-speaking fans by its Web address, 2chan.net.
One of the things that struck Poole was that the site let people
post in its discussion forums exceptionally quickly. It didn’t espe-
cially register with him that Japan also happened to be a place
where cultural distinctions between public and private life mat-
ter deeply—where, in a sense, having two identities isn’t so much a
failure of integrity as a working definition of it. Nor did the related
facts that Japan’s Internet users tend to have a particularly deep-
rooted attachment to online pseudonyms and other alternate iden-
tities (as Facebook, still struggling to crack the Japanese market,
has learned the hard way) or that the Futaba Channel, like most
Japanese image boards, has always offered fully anonymous post-
ing with no log-in required. None of this was what compelled
him to grab a copy of the Futaba Channel’s source code, rewrite
the site’s text in English (guessing at some of the Japanese words’
meanings, running the rest through the translation engine Babel
Fish), and start operating it as 4chan in October 2003. Poole recalls
how Babel Fish translated the kanji signifying Futaba’s default
username: “Nameless.” He changed it to “Anonymous,” and that,
more or less, was that.
“It wasn’t a principled decision,” says Poole. Not at first. “It
became one, as I grew from 15 to 18 to now 22 …. But as a 15-year-
t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w s e p t e m b e r / o c t o b e r 2010
8/11/10 4:39 PM
 With its acceptance of anonymity, 4chan is pretty much the
opposite of where the mainstream Internet seems headed.
Social-networking sites such as Facebook are trying to close
the gap between online and offline identities.
old, I wasn’t too concerned with a lot of the things I really stand
for now. I kind of grew into that.”
4chan kind of grew into it, too. In the beginning, the site had only
two topic sections: /a/ for anime-related posts, and /b/ for every-
thing else. In subsequent years Poole gradually added topics, and
there are now nearly 50 of them, including /v/ for video games,
/fa/ for fashion, /po/ for paper craft and origami, and at least three
for specialized varieties of Japanese cartoon erotica and porn. But
/b/ has grown more steadily than any of the others, and it long ago
surpassed anime as 4chan’s principal reason for being. As the one
section without any explicit rules about what can and can’t be posted
(other than certain sitewide prohibitions against child pornography
and other violations of U.S. law), /b/ is where 4chan makes good on
what its anonymity promises: the freedom to say anything without
the obligation to suffer consequences.
To a first-time visitor, /b/ may not seem very promising at
all. Aside from the sheer quantity of tastelessness that courses
through its message threads, they present a wall of endlessly recy-
cled inside references, catchphrases, and fragmentary punch lines,
the briefest sampling of which will baffle: “herp derp,” “newfag,”
“over 9000!,” “So I herd u liek Mudkips,” “serious business,” “The
Game (you just lost it),” “an hero,” “Candleja—.” Much harder to
convey, though, is the improbable awesomeness of what /b/ reveals
to those who come to know it better: the flashes of inspiration and
deranged wit that flicker continually as /b/’s anonymous millions—
the /b/tards, as they call themselves—work and rework variations
w w w . t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w . c o m
Sept10 Feature Moot.indd 85
on the esoteric routines. As this compost heap of in-jokes ripens,
sometimes one of them will vault into popularity as a broader
Internet meme (the most visible recent example, perhaps, is Pedo-
bear, a creepy, vacant-eyed cartoon teddy bear whose picture is
used to ridicule seekers of child pornography).
4channers have a word for all this: lulz, which in its strictest
sense means laughs, jest, cheap amusement, but in a broader sense
encompasses both the furious creativity that generates /b/’s vast
repertoire of memes and the rollicking subcultural intensity they
inspire. And if 4chan’s anonymity is good for anything, it turns out,
it’s good for lulz. Consider, Poole explains, how the fixed identities
in other online communities can stifle creativity: where usernames
are required (whether real or pseudonymous), a new user who posts
a few failed attempts at humor will soon find other users associat-
ing that name with failure. “Even if you’re posting gold by day eight,”
says Poole, “they’ll be like, ‘Oh, this guy sucks.’ ” Names, in other
words, make failure costly, thus discouraging even the attempt to
succeed. By the same token, namelessness makes failure cheap—
nearly costless, reputation-wise, in a setting like 4chan, where the
Anonymous who posted a lame joke five minutes ago might well be
the same Anonymous who’s mocking it hilariously right now. And
as the social-media theorist Clay Shirky has suggested in another
context (explaining how the plummeting costs of networked collab-
oration encourage, say, a thousand open-source software projects
to launch for every one that gets anywhere), the closer a community
gets to “failure for free,” the better its chances of generating success.
feature story 85
8/11/10 4:39 PM
 That may not be the only thing Poole meant when he talked
at TED about 4chan’s importance as a place to be wrong. But it’s
ultimately the reason he was on that stage, and it’s starting to look
like the reason he’ll be in a spotlight for a while to come.
4CHAN INTO FORTUNE?
On May 13, 2010, just after the end of his sophomore year in col-
lege, Poole filed notice with the Securities and Exchange Com-
mission about an extracurricular activity: raising $625,000 for a
new online venture. The time had come, he felt, for something like
a reboot. After seven years of administrative and technological
tweaks to 4chan, he no longer sees it as a project much in need of
his creative attention. Meanwhile, he notes, Web technology has
evolved far beyond 4chan’s “decade-old code and decade-or-two-
old paradigm”—that of the classic pre-Web bulletin board—and
he is eager to reimagine what a modern discussion forum can be.
The name of the new site is Canvas, and Poole hopes to launch it
The radical transparency of Facebook may not be mutually
exclusive with what we might as well call the radical opacity
of 4chan. Their uses may even be mutually necessary.
this fall. People will have the option of signing in, although Poole
says he hopes to keep Canvas relatively free of “vanity and ego.”
As on 4chan, users will be able to post comments anonymously
and to switch fluidly between multiple identities.
It says something that investors in Canvas—who include Marc
Andreessen (creator of the first graphical Web browser) and Ron
Conway (an early Google backer)—would bet on a track record like
Poole’s. For all of 4chan’s eye-popping traffic stats, it’s doomed to
bare-subsistence revenue by the combination of its scandalous
content (palatable only to low-rent advertisers like porn sites)
and Poole’s profound discomfort with, as he puts it, the “tons of
ways I could essentially rape the site for dollars” (including pop-
ups, ads with sound, and other high-paying but obnoxious forms
of advertising that would antagonize 4chan’s community). And
whether it was the 2006 “dirty bomb” incident, in which 20-year-
old Jake Brahm flooded /b/ with threats to detonate radioactive
explosives at NFL games, or the harrowing of Jessi Slaughter
this July, in which the troll hordes of /b/ rained death threats
and other anonymous harassment on an 11-year-old Florida girl,
the portrayal of 4chan in the national news has mainly reflected
the image of a menace to be contained rather than an enterprise
to watch.
And yet, many in the Internet business have been watching
4chan with interest. The steady growth of its traffic and the viral
86 feature story
Sept10 Feature Moot.indd 86
spread of its content, after all, represent the kind of social success
that Web businesses require. “Getting engaged users is the tough
part,” says David Lee, who invested in Canvas as a partner in Con-
way’s SV Angel firm. Profit or no profit, he explains, 4chan shows
that Poole “is the rare entrepreneur who can get engaged users.”
And given how firmly anonymity is held to be a recipe for social-
media failure, it’s intriguing that the site works at all. 4chan “was
a thing that challenged people’s assumptions in the Web industry,”
says Jonah Peretti, CEO of the viral-media startup BuzzFeed and
cofounder of the Huffington Post. “It was just so different from
the way other people were thinking about community.”
This year Poole got an official invitation to speak to developers
at Facebook’s headquarters in Palo Alto, CA. He was asked about
his experiences running a site that Ruchi Sangvi, the Facebook
product manager who proposed the visit, calls “the polar opposite”
of their own. Roughly 80 Facebook employees attended, squeez-
ing into a standing-room-only conference room, and though there
was some trepidation at first—some Facebookers expected Poole
to be an apologist for hackers and child porn—by all accounts
the visit was cordial. “He’s a really, really smart guy with a great
vision,” says Richard Cho, a Facebook recruiter who helped orga-
nize the event. In fact, Cho says Poole is “not dissimilar to Mark
Zuckerberg,” in that both have “interesting viewpoints” about
how people connect and share information. But there was also
a simpler reason for Facebook’s sympathy for the man behind
4chan: “There are some of us that have frequented that site quite
a bit,” Cho says. “ ‘I can has cheezburger?’ is just a common part
of our vernacular internally.”
After all, the radical transparency of Mark Zuckerberg and Face-
book may not be mutually exclusive with what we might as well
call the radical opacity of Christopher “moot” Poole and 4chan.
Their uses may even be mutually necessary. Peretti puts it this way:
if 4chan is the id of the Internet, then “Google is kind of like the
ego, and Facebook is kind of like the superego.” If that’s so, then
there’s only one way the trend toward radical transparency won’t
end up killing the Internet’s soul: if we can leave the light of all that
openness every now and then to spend some time in the shadows
where the crazy lives.
Julian Dibbell is a freelance writer living in chicago. his work has ap-
peareD in the Best technology Writing series in 2007, 2008, anD 2009, anD
he is the author of Play Money: or, hoW i Quit My Day JoB anD MaDe Millions
traDing Virtual loot (basic books, 2006).
t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w s e p t e m b e r / o c t o b e r 2010
8/11/10 4:39 PM
 88 teChnologY oVerVieW 92 China
89 inDuStrY ChallengeS 92 oVer the horiZon
90 CaSe StuDY 93 PoliCY briefing: elec-
90 reSearCh to WatCh 94 marKet WatCh tricity
91 natural gaS 95 ComPanieS to WatCh

Briefing: fuelS

A drilling rig seeks

oil 140 miles off the
coast of Louisiana.

introduction over the next two decades. By 2030, the In the next decade, some oil can be
use of petroleum, coal, and natural gas is replaced by ethanol: U.S. producers will
Fossil Fuels expected to jump by 23 percent, 44 per- make about 12 billion gallons of it from

Remain a cent, and 37 percent, respectively. “You

look at the world of renewables and you
corn this year. But that’s a small fraction
of the roughly 170 billion gallons of gaso-

Mainstay see a lot of progress, but they are not

going to outpace the growing demand
for energy,” says Peter Jackson, a senior
director at IHS Cambridge Energy
line and diesel that will be consumed in
2010. Making biofuels at a significantly
larger scale will mean using cellulosic
biomass as a feedstock for ethanol and

S cientists generally agree that to

limit global warming to less than
2.4 °C—and avoid the worst effects of
climate change—greenhouse-gas emis-
sions must be reduced 50 percent by
2050. But humanity is a long way from
being weaned from the petroleum,
natural gas, and coal whose use causes
pau L tag gart/Wp n
Research Associates, an energy consul-
tancy and think tank.
The near-term challenge, therefore, is
to find ways to extract fossil fuels safely
and use them in ways that emit as little
carbon dioxide as possible. But dwin-
dling supplies in conventional oil fields
are forcing the petroleum industry to
other fuels, and deriving fuels from cus-
tom-engineered microbes.
Coal, the dirtiest fossil fuel, accounts
for 42 percent of electricity production
worldwide and 45 percent in the United
States. The good news is that natural gas
is far more abundant than was thought
only a few years ago. And replacing coal

much of this pollution. drill in deeper waters and pursue hard- plants with natural-gas plants could
In fact, global energy demand is to-extract deposits such as the tar sands greatly reduce carbon dioxide emissions.
expected to increase about 40 percent of Alberta, Canada. —David Talbot

w w w . t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w . c o m briefing 87

Sept10 Briefing.indd 87 8/10/10 5:10 PM


technology oVerView
Making Cellulosic Biofuels
Competitive
A
s long as electric vehicles remain a
niche, biofuels will be the most seri-
ous alternative to fossil fuels as a way
to power cars and trucks. Millions of
existing vehicles can run on fuels mixed
with high concentrations of ethanol or
biodiesel. The rest, hundreds of millions
more in the U.S., can run on mixtures
that include some ethanol.
Making vast quantities of biofuels
without cutting into food supplies, how-
ever, means finding a way to use wood
chips, corn stalks, and other forms of cel-
lulosic biomass as feedstocks. Dozens of
Data Shot
387
average parts per million of
carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, as
measured by mauna Loa observa-
tory, in hawaii, in 2009. the level has
increased 71 parts per million since
1959.
88 briefing
Sept10 Briefing.indd 88
This jar contains a
sample of switch-
grass, one type of
cellulosic feedstock.
pilot and demonstration-scale plants for
producing cellulosic ethanol have been
built across the United States, and a few
are planned abroad, including some in
China. But it’s still not clear when the
technology will prove competitive.
Most approaches to making cellu-
losic biofuels require enzymes to break
down cellulose into simple sugars, but
these enzymes are expensive. Some
companies have developed cheaper
ones—Denmark-based Novozymes, for
example, says it has lowered the cost
by 80 percent over the past two years—
while others are engineering microbes
to create their own. An organism devel-
oped by Qteros, in Marlborough, MA,
produces enzymes that convert cellu-
lose into sugar and then turns that sugar
into ethanol.
Another strategy is to try to get rid of
the enzymes altogether. For example,
Coskata, based in Warrenville, IL, uses
gasification technology to break down
biomass and municipal waste into car-
bon monoxide and hydrogen. It has
Surging DemanD
A mix of fuels will meet the world’s
energy needs over the next 25 years.
Total world energy use by fuel type
(1990–2035)
800 quadrillion BTU
FORECAST
700
600
500
Renewables*
Nuclear
400
Coal
300
Natural gas
200
100 Liquids**
0
’90 ’00 ’10 ’20 ’30
*Includes hydroelectric, solar, wind, geothermal,
biomass, and tidal.
**Includes all biofuels; all liquid fuels derived from
petroleum, gas, and coal; and liquid hydrogen.
Source: U.S. Energy Information Administration
developed organisms that can feed on
this mixture and produce ethanol.
Other companies are trying to make
fuels that resemble gasoline or diesel. BP
and DuPont are developing a process for
turning cellulose into butanol, an alcohol
with properties similar to those of gaso-
line. LS9, in South San Francisco, has
used synthetic biology to design organ-
isms that can process sugars into some-
thing “essentially indistinguishable” from
c har Li e n e i b e r gaLL /ap; aLL c harts by to m my m c caLL
petroleum-based fuels such as diesel.
But these companies also need to build
large biorefineries capable of produc-
ing fuels as cheap as gasoline, which has
production costs of around $2.00 a gal-
lon. The latest public data suggest that
it costs between $3.00 and $4.50 to pro-
duce cellulosic ethanol that matches the
energy content of a gallon of gasoline.
The figure for corn ethanol is $2.40.
—Kevin Bullis
t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w s e p t e m b e r / o c t o b e r 2010
8/10/10 5:10 PM
 BrIeFING: FUeLS

Data Shot
INDUStrY chaLLeNGeS

The End of Easy Oil $1.78

The cost per gallon to U.S. taxpayers of
subsidies aimed at replacing gasoline
with conventional corn ethanol, accord-
ing to the congressional budget Office.

T he world won’t run short of petroleum

in the next few decades, but there’s
a limited supply of easy-to-reach oil.
Between now and 2030, production from
such “conventional” sources will barely
rise—from 79 million to 85 million bar-
rels per day.
During the same period, demand
for liquid fuels is expected to rise from
86 million to 106 million barrels per
day. While more than half of that extra
demand will be met by other sources,
such as biofuels and fuels derived from
coal or natural gas, the petroleum indus-
try will have to make up the rest from
harder-to-extract oil supplies.
To get at this oil, companies will drill
in deep waters to tap reserves below the
ocean floor. By 2030, the production of
oil from waters deeper than 600 meters
will increase from five million to 10 mil-
lion barrels per day. This year’s disaster in
the Gulf of Mexico—where BP was drill-
ing at a depth of 1,500 meters—highlights
the risks involved.
And petroleum companies will increas-
ingly turn to unconventional sources
such as tar sands. The largest of these
molasses-like deposits are in Canada and
Venezuela, whose combined resources of
this type are believed to exceed the total
world resources held in conventional
oil fields. Production from these areas is
projected to rise from 2.3 million barrels
per day at present to 5.5 million barrels
per day in 2030, according to a study by
Cambridge Energy Research Associates,
an energy consultancy.
That increase will meet about 16 per-
cent of the total demand, but at the cost
of a disproportionate environmental
impact. It takes huge amounts of energy
to extract and process tar sands, gener-
ating two to four times the greenhouse
gases associated with conventional
petroleum production.
As oil gets harder to find, prices may
rise, which will make riskier exploration
more worthwhile and also boost alterna-
tives, including advanced biofuels. But a
price on carbon emissions could change
the calculus, making tar sands particu-
larly uneconomical. —David Talbot
SouRCeS of fuel
Hard-to-extract oil, and oil alterna-
tives, will make up a growing share.
Production of liquid fuels
Historical Unconventional
sources*
Oil from conventional oil fields,
including deepwater

120 million barrels/day

100

80

60

40

20

FORECAST
0
’90 ’00 ’10 ’20 ’30 ’40 ’50
A worker holds a blob
Lara S O LT/ c O r b I S

*Includes coal- and gas-to-liquids, biofuels, liquid

of tar sands from natural gas, and tar sands.
a mine in Alberta,
Source: IHS Energy Research Associates
Canada.

w w w . t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w . c o M briefing 89

Sept10 Briefing.indd 89 8/11/10 4:11 PM

 briefing: fuels
case study
Mascoma: Seeking
a Market Toehold
W hen the biofuels startup Mascoma
launched in 2005, it hoped to capi-
talize on technology that would produce
ethanol from wood chips and other plant
waste in an efficient one-step process.
Mascoma secured $30 million in
financing by 2006 and began building a
200,000-gallon–per-year pilot plant in
Rome, NY, the following year. In 2008,
the company heralded new research
advances toward genetically engineered
bacteria that could thrive at high tem-
Mascoma’s cellulosic-ethanol pilot plant in Rome, NY, showed that a promising technology
worked. But a shortage of investors has hampered plans for a commercial-scale plant.
peratures. Using them made it possible
to reduce by 60 percent the quantity of
costly enzymes needed to degrade cel-
lulose into fermentable sugars. The com-
pany announced plans to build one of the
first commercial-scale cellulosic-ethanol
plants, in Kinross, MI; it would be able to
produce 80 million gallons per year.
But as of the summer of 2010,
Mascoma had yet to begin construc-
tion. Simply put, nobody would lend it
90 briefing
Sept10 Briefing.indd 90
the money for a production plant whose
product would compete with relatively
cheap oil. “The bottom line is, these are
high-risk, first-of-kind plants,” says Mike
Cleary, director of the National Bioen-
ergy Center at the National Renewable
Energy Laboratory in Golden, CO. “Get-
ting banks to loan them money is hard.”
Mascoma received $49.5 million from
the U.S. Department of Energy and the
state of Michigan to finance its cellulosic-
ethanol operations, and that funding has
been earmarked for the Kinross plant.
But Alan Belcher, Mascoma’s senior vice
president of operations, says the com-
pany would need more than $100 million
to build that facility.
A viable future for cellulosic ethanol
will require changes in government policy,
says Belcher. An existing federal mandate
caps the amount of ethanol blended with
gasoline in auto fuel at 10 percent of the
total mixture. Existing production capac-
ity for corn ethanol can already meet the
resulting demand, which amounts to 13.5
billion gallons a year. Right now, there’s
really no room for any more ethanol
on the market, no matter how it’s pro-
duced. At the least, the blend limit must
be raised; then a different set of federal
mandates, dictating minimum use of
advanced biofuels such as cellulosic etha-
nol, can kick in and provide a market for
Mascoma’s product, Belcher says.
Mascoma currently hopes to break
ground at Kinross in 2011. The goal is to
begin production at 20 million gallons of
ethanol per year, using 500,000 tons of
hardwood pulpwood as feedstock. But to
get there, great technology simply won’t
be enough. —Nidhi Subbaraman
research to watch
Building
Microbial Fuel
Factories
V iewed from a biofuels perspective,
biological plants waste huge amounts
of energy: they use sunlight to make cel-
lulose, starch, lignin, and seeds, some
of which can then be broken down and
converted into fuels. A growing body of
research is seeking to genetically engi-
neer organisms to make liquid fuels
directly. Organisms optimized in this
way could theoretically be an order of
magnitude more efficient than technolo-
gies that make fuels from biomass.
Joule Unlimited, a startup based in
Cambridge, MA, is genetically altering
photosynthetic microörganisms so that
over their lifetime, they devote only 5
percent of the solar energy they absorb
to growing and staying alive. The rest
c o u rte sy o f mas c o ma
goes to secreting a steady supply of
diesel fuel. The company, which is
building a pilot plant in Leander, TX,
says its process will generate 15 to 25
t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w s e p t e m b e r / o c t o b e r 2010
8/10/10 5:10 PM
 briefing: fuels

natural gas

Tapping an Unconventional Source

I n recent years it has become clear that

Grow lights illuminate flasks of photosyn-
thetic microörganisms that produce biofuels.
times as much fuel per acre as technol-
ogy for making fuels from cellulosic
biomass, but that it will take several
years to demonstrate at a large scale.
Synthetic Genomics, with funding from
ExxonMobil that could exceed $300
million, is taking a similar approach,
working with algae.
To replace all petroleum with biofu-
els, however, it might be necessary to
genetically engineer organisms that get
energy through potentially more effi-
cient mechanisms. And the U.S. Depart-
ment of Energy’s Advanced Research
Projects Agency–Energy (ARPA-E) is
funding 13 projects that are engineer-
ing organisms to convert electricity
and hydrogen—ideally from renewable
sources—into liquid fuels for conven-
tional cars. —Kevin Bullis
the United States and Canada hold
a bonanza in recoverable natural gas, a
resource once thought to be declining.
Because natural gas releases just half as
much carbon dioxide as coal when it’s
burned to produce a comparable amount
of electricity, the fuel could play an impor-
tant role in reducing carbon emissions.
In the United States, for example, 45
percent of electricity comes from coal
and 23 percent from natural gas. If half
the electricity from coal were replaced
with electricity from natural gas, it would
eliminate 20 percent of the U.S. carbon
riSing eStimateS on natural gaS
Estimates of recoverable natural gas from unconventional sources in the United
States and Canada have risen sharply; data is lacking on such sources elsewhere.
Estimated remaining recoverable gas resources
Canada European Union
and Norway
United
States
Africa
Mexico
Brazil
dioxide emissions attributable to elec-
tricity generation.
Much of the optimism stems from
the discovery that natural gas can be
extracted economically from vast depos-
its of shale found across the United
States (see “Natural Gas Changes the
Energy Map,” November/December 2009).
At current rates of consumption, those
resources alone could meet U.S. demand
for decades. Known worldwide supplies
of natural gas add up to 150 times annual
global consumption, and this estimate
doesn’t include unconventional sources
outside North America. —David Talbot
Russia
Central Asia
and rest
of Europe
China
India
Middle
East Rest of Asia

Rest of Americas Australia

Data Shot and Oceania

77%
Natural-gas resources Reserves (trillion cubic feet)
Unconventional resources (mean) 5,000
Yet-to-find resources (mean)* 2,500
the growth in the estimated amount Reserve growth (mean) 1000
Proved reserves 50
of recoverable u.s. natural gas since
b o b o’c o n n o r

1990, thanks to new approaches to

*Based on geological assessments and statistical analysis.
drilling in unconventional deposits.
Source: The Future of Natural Gas: An Interdisciplinary MIT Study

w w w . t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w . c o m briefing 91

Sept10 Briefing.indd 91 8/10/10 5:10 PM

 The Shenhua coal-to-liquids plant pumps
out a million gallons of diesel fuel per day
and may start burying carbon dioxide, too.

a billion gallons or more into gasoline at

the pump. To try to mitigate emissions,
Shenhua has started a small carbon
sequestration project that is expected
to inject 100,000 tons of carbon dioxide
into a deep saline aquifer by the end of
this year. Its vast plant can potentially
capture 2.9 million tons of carbon diox-
china
ide annually—about four-fifths of the

Beijing Sees Future plant’s emissions. —Peter Fairley

in Liquefied Coal
oVer the horiZon

W ith a shortage of domestic oil and
an automobile market that’s now
the world’s biggest, China has begun
a large-scale program to transform its
abundant coal resources into motor
fuels. It’s already home to the world’s
largest coal liquefaction plant—a facility
in Inner Mongolia that reached its full
capacity last year and can now pump out
a million gallons of diesel fuel per day.
The plant made China only the second
country in the world, after South Africa,
to successfully derive liquid fuels from
coal on a commercial scale. Built by coal
producer Shenhua Group, the facility
uses the heat and hydrogen generated by
gasifying a small amount of coal to brew
a wet slurry made from a second stream
of coal into diesel fuel. The process
makes economic sense but inflicts an
environmental double whammy. Simply
making the fuel produces prodigious
quintuple its coal-to-diesel capacity by
2013. And that company is not the only
player involved.
Other Chinese plants are turning coal
into methanol and catalytically syn-
thesizing gasified coal into a variety of
chemical commodities. Since 2007, Chi-
nese fuel marketers have been blending
Coal-hungrY China
Despite the prodigious carbon emis-
sions associated with coal, Beijing is
digging deeper.
Coal consumption in China (2000–2030)
Power generation Other
100 quads
FORECAST
80
The Quest
to Sequester
O ne way to continue using coal and
other fossil fuels without promoting
catastrophic climate change would be to
capture the carbon dioxide released by
burning them and then pump it under-
ground for permanent storage, a process
called carbon sequestration.
This strategy has been demonstrated
in a few places. But for it to make a sig-
nificant impact on carbon emissions,
researchers must find economical ways
to capture the gas, plus practical ways
to liquefy and bury billions of tons of it
each year—and keep this up for decades.
The need is staggering: coal accounts for
20 percent of all greenhouse-gas emis-
sions worldwide. In the United States, for
u s-c h i na e n e r gy c e nte r, W e st Vi r g i n ia u n iVe r s ity

amounts of carbon dioxide, even before
the fuel itself is burned. It also uses enor-
mous amounts of another scarce Chi-
nese commodity: water.
Despite these negatives, China will
keep pursuing the technology. “They do
not have a better way to meet this need,”
says Qingyun Sun, a coal-to-liquids
expert at West Virginia University.
Indeed, Shenhua Group is planning to
60
example, 600 coal-fired power plants emit
two billion tons of carbon dioxide annu-
40
ally. China’s coal emissions are roughly
double that amount and growing rapidly.
20 The first problem is capturing the gas.
Right now, retrofitting existing power
0 plants with carbon dioxide scrubbers will
’00 ’05 ’15 ’30
eat up a quarter of the energy the plant
Source: CCIDRC produces. Jared Ciferno, who special-
izes in carbon capture technology at the

92 briefing t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w s e p t e m b e r / o c t o b e r 2010

Sept10 Briefing.indd 92 8/10/10 5:10 PM

 briefing: fuels

U.S. Department of Energy’s National

Energy Technology Laboratory, says this Policy
loss needs to be cut to 18 percent to make
post-combustion carbon dioxide capture
economically viable.
Piecemeal Efforts Fall Short
Alternative processes exist: coal can
be turned into a combustible gas, which
produces a purer stream of easier-to-
capture carbon dioxide when it’s burned.
However, gasification plants cost more
than coal-burning ones. A few of these are
D espite ongoing concerns about
the United States’ vast appetite for
petroleum in general and foreign oil in
fuel supply: roughly 17 percent of annual
gasoline consumption. According to
the federal mandates, 21 billion gallons
under construction in Indiana, Pennsyl- particular, Washington has taken only must be advanced biofuels rather than
vania, and Tianjin, China, but they would piecemeal measures to address the chal- the biofuels that are commercially avail-
not be cost-effective without government lenge. Collectively, these efforts will able now, such as corn-derived ethanol.
incentives. have only a small impact on the amount The technology exists to make these new
Then there’s the problem of burying of oil the country consumes. fuels, which include ethanol made from
the carbon dioxide. Here, there is some In April, the U.S. Environmental Pro- cellulosic sources such as grasses, and
good news: many major coal-burning tection Agency and the Department of other fuels derived from sources such as
countries and regions, including the
United States and China, are believed
to have geological features suitable for
sequestration, especially deep saline
aquifers that sit beneath multiple lay-
ers of rock to keep carbon dioxide safely
trapped. What’s more, where sequestra-
tion has been tried, geologists report that
the carbon dioxide hasn’t leaked, even in
regions where decades of oil drilling have
perforated underground rocks.
However, there are still no financial or
regulatory incentives for power produc-
ers to pursue carbon sequestration. It’s
unlikely that the technology will get very
far without, for example, a tax or other
mechanism for putting a price on carbon.
Says Julio Friedmann, director of Law-
rence Livermore National Laboratory’s A Toyota dealership in Torrance, CA, advertises the fuel economy of the hybrid Prius.
Carbon Storage Initiative, “We need
incentives to get the sequestration mar- Transportation tightened fuel economy algae. But attempts to make them in vol-
ket moving.”—Peter Fairley regulations: cars will be required to ume are off to a slow start.
achieve an average of 35.5 miles per gal- The federal mandates initially required
lon starting in 2016, up from 27.5 today. that energy distributors use 100 mil-
Data Shot The EPA expects this change to save 1.8 lion gallons of cellulosic ethanol this
billion barrels of oil over the lifetime of year, but the EPA scaled this back to 6.5

89% the vehicles sold under these regulations. million gallons because no commercial
r o byn b e c k/af p/g etty i mag e s

the worldwide share of conventional
ethanol produced in the united states
(mainly from corn) and brazil (mainly
from sugarcane) in 2009.
But that’s only a bit more oil than the U.S.
consumes in three months.
In 2007, Congress passed a bill direct-
ing fuel companies to distribute 36 bil-
lion gallons of biofuels a year by 2022.
That’s a small but significant chunk of the
cellulosic-ethanol plants have been built
yet. The EPA plans to waive next year’s
even larger requirements, too. For the
foreseeable future, advanced biofuels
aren’t going to make much of a dent in
petroleum consumption. —Kevin Bullis

w w w . t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w . c o m briefing 93

Sept10 Briefing.indd 93 8/10/10 5:10 PM

 A pilot-scale biorefinery in Jennings, LA,
turns agricultural waste into ethanol. BP
acquired the facility in a deal with Verenium.

producer of natural gas from U.S.

sources.
In July, BP decided to sell off $7 billion
in oil and gas fields to Apache, in part to
cover the bill for its Gulf of Mexico oil
spill. This deal also showed a turn toward
unconventional fossil fuels; BP decided
to focus on developing its deep offshore
oil resources rather than more conven-
tional land-based resources.
The major oil companies’ investments
in biofuels are on a much smaller scale.
This year BP bought the cellulosic-
ethanol business of Verenium. The $98.3
million purchase included Verenium’s
1.4-million-gallon-a-year demonstration
plant, which converts leftovers from
sugarcane processing (among other
things) into ethanol. When it comes to
biofuels, however, the major oil compa-
nies are currently focused less on
acquisitions and more on research and
market watch development. ExxonMobil, for example,

Big Oil Gets Bigger could end up investing more than $600
million in a joint venture with Synthetic
Genomics to make renewable fuels from
algae. —Kevin Bullis

T o meet the ever more challenging

demands of extraction while moving
toward less carbon-intensive fuels, big oil
companies are diversifying. They’re buy-
ing smaller companies with experience
in tapping unconventional sources of oil
and natural gas, and they’re also making
bets on biofuels.
The first half of 2010 saw 322 oil-
industry mergers and acquisitions with a
value of $90.8 billion worldwide—nearly
as much as the full year of deals in 2008
and on track to beat 2009, according to
PLS, a research firm based in Houston.
Much of the activity was in the United
States and involved unconventional
resources. There were 13 deals involving
the Marcellus shale, a vast deposit of
BiofuelS iP
In 1990 a University of Florida microbi-
ologist, Lonnie Ingram, transferred genes
responsible for ethanol fermentation to
E. coli from another bacterium. Many of
the descriptions and examples in the
patent involved hemicellulosic sugars,
which make up a large fraction of the
sugars available in cellulosic biomass
b rad P U c k eTT/ Lak e c har Le S aM e r I can P r e S S/aP

Data Shot natural gas in the eastern United States. such as corn stalks and wood chips. The
Royal Dutch Shell, for example, bought

$8.2 billion
Value of mergers and acquisitions
involving the Marcellus shale, the huge
natural-gas resource in the northeast-
ern United States, in the second quarter
of this year.
East Resources for $4.7 billion, thereby
acquiring 2,600 square kilometers of
resources in the region. In June,
ExxonMobil completed its acquisition
of XTO, an independent producer of
unconventional natural gas and oil, in a
transaction worth $36 billion. The
acquisition made Exxon the largest
patent thus described a way to make
cellulosic-ethanol production practical. It
has been cited 23 times, including four
in 2010, suggesting that it’s one of the
more important patents in the field.
To see IPVision’s interactive analysis
of Ingram’s patent and its impact,
go to www.technologyreview.com/
briefings/fuels.

94 briefing t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w s e p t e m b e r / o c t o b e r 2010

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 briefing: fuels

companies to watch: public

BP Technology: Now infamous for the Deepwater Horizon a major stake in another ethanol refinery currently under
Surviving the spill spill, this U.K.-based oil and gas giant is a global leader in construction in the U.K. It recently acquired a million-gal-
www.bp.com deepwater exploration and drilling technology. It has also lon-per-year cellulosic-ethanol facility from the startup
Founded:1909 invested heavily in advanced biofuels. Market: In addition Verenium; it is also collaborating with DuPont to develop
Management: Robert Dudley to being one of the world’s leading producers of conven- biobutanol and with a startup called Martek Biosciences to
(CEO), Carl-Henric Svanberg
(chairman) Phil New (CEO, BP
tional oil, BP is one of the largest distributors of biofuels. It develop microbial biodiesel. Challenges and next steps:
Biofuels), Lamar McKay (chair- blends over a billion gallons of ethanol a year in the United The Gulf of Mexico was one of BP’s main centers of deep-
man, BP America) States, a market that will only grow: the country’s Renew- water operations, and its future in the region is unclear.
Employees: 80,300 able Fuel Standard calls for 36 billion gallons of renewable Although BP has made significant investments in biofu-
Revenues: $246.1 billion
R&D: $587.0 million fuels to be used in 2022. Strategy: In 2008, BP invested in a els, the world’s largest market for these fuels is the United
Market cap: $129.7 billion sugarcane-ethanol venture in Brazil, and the company has States, where it now faces a public-relations battle.

China Shenhua Technology: Shenhua is developing technology for turn- Strategy: As China attempts to move away from coal-fired
ing coal into liquid fuels and deploying it on a large scale. power plants in favor of cleaner alternatives like hydro-
Energy Company The company opened China’s first coal-to-liquids plant power and nuclear, the country’s largest coal producer is
Developing new uses for coal
in Mongolia at the end of 2008, and late last year it broke betting that liquid fuels will be the key to its future growth.
www.csec.com
Founded:1995 ground on a $10 billion coal-to-chemicals plant in collabo- Challenges and next steps: In addition to producing car-
Management: Ling Wen ration with Dow Chemical. It is also seeking approval for bon emissions, which could make operations more costly
(president), Wang Jinli (vice a joint venture with Sasol to build a coal-to-liquids facility as China considers mitigation strategies, coal-to-liquids
president of strategic planning)
Employees: 62,286
that is designed to produce nearly 100,000 barrels of fuel plants require huge amounts of water, making their wide-
Revenues: $17.7 billion per day. Market: China is oil poor but coal rich, so coal-to- spread use potentially problematic in a country where a
R&D: N/A liquids technology is crucial if the country is to meet its massive recent build-out of hydropower has made water
Market cap: $82.0 billion growing energy needs without relying on foreign imports. rights a politically charged topic.

Duke Energy Technology: Investments in advanced gas-fueled power Strategy: Duke has become a prominent supporter of reg-
Utility seeks a price on carbon plants and wind turbines are offsetting some of Duke ulating greenhouse-gas emissions. It says its position is
www.duke-energy.com Energy’s reliance on coal, which accounts for 62 percent of motivated largely by a desire for certainty about policy as
Founded:1909 the power it generates. So far, gas, hydropower, and wind it faces the need to replace aging power plants. Challenges
Management: James Rogers account for only 7 percent of the power produced, but a total and next steps: Congress’s failure to pass comprehensive
(CEO), David Mohler (CTO),
Roberta Bowman (chief sus-
of 5,000 megawatts of wind power is in development. The climate and energy legislation may lead the utility to add
tainabililty officer) company has applied for approval to build new nuclear reac- new generating capacity that, over the long term, could push
Employees: 18,680 tors. Market: About four million customers rely on Duke emissions and electricity prices higher than they would
Revenues: $12.7 billion Energy for electricity. It owns 27,000 megawatts of genera- be if clear policies had been put in place. Like some other
R&D: N/A
Market cap: $22.2 billion tion capacity in its franchised electricity business and nearly utilities, Duke is also facing challenges getting new nuclear
8,000 megawatts in a commercial power enterprise. power plants approved and funded.

DuPont Technology: In addition to developing biobutanol in col- DuPont believes it can drive that cost down further by refin-
Getting into biofuels laboration with BP, DuPont is looking to commercial- ing the process as it moves toward commercial production.
www.dupont.com ize cellulosic ethanol—biofuel made from sources such as Strategy: DuPont is developing a number of clean-fuel tech-
Founded:1802 stems and leaves—through a joint venture with the Dan- nologies, whether by producing fuels itself or by licensing
Management: Ellen J. ish enzyme maker Danisco. In January, the companies its chemical processes to other companies. Challenges and
Kullman (CEO), Uma
Chowdhry (chief science and
opened a 250,000-gallon-a-year demonstration plant in next steps: This fall, DuPont and Danisco are expected to
technology officer) Tennessee, which uses corncobs and switchgrass as the announce plans for their first commercial-scale biorefinery
Employees: 58,000 feedstocks. DuPont provides expertise in pretreating the to produce cellulosic ethanol. They also plan to license their
Revenues: $26.1 billion biomass, which makes it easier to turn cellulose into sugars. technology to others. Like all biofuel producers, they rely on
R&D: $1.4 billion
Market cap: $33.9 billion Market: At the facility in Tennessee, the company is already government subsidies and grants and must continue to do
producing ethanol at a cost of less than $2.00 per gallon. so until the industry gets on its feet.

ExxonMobil Technology: In the 1960s ExxonMobil invented a system, oil and gas resources to meet the world’s growing energy
Expanding into emerging now standard throughout the industry, that uses sound demand, the company is looking to advanced biofuels. It
markets waves to draw a high-resolution, three-dimensional picture has also launched an initiative with Synthetic Genomics to
www.exxonmobil.com of mineral formations deep underground. The company develop and commercialize biofuels produced using algae;
Founded:1870 also uses a technology it developed to discover reservoirs ExxonMobil expects to invest more than $600 million if
Management: Rex W. Tiller-
son (CEO), Emil Jacobs (vice
in ultradeep water, taking advantage of the fact that oil and benchmarks are met. Challenges and next steps: Although
president for R&D, ExxonMobil gas are poor conductors of electricity. Market: ExxonMo- worldwide energy demand is expected to continue grow-
Research and Engineering) bil is the world’s largest non-government-owned company; ing in the coming decades, oil consumption in the United
Employees: 80,700 it is involved in oil production, refining, distribution, and States and Europe actually declined last year, because of
Revenues: $310.6 billion
R&D: $1.0 billion retail sales. It produces over 2 million barrels of crude oil the economic downturn. The company will have to keep
Market cap: $296.6 billion a day. Strategy: In addition to exploring unconventional expanding into emerging markets and alternative fuels.

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 briefing: fuels
companies to watch: public
Petrobras
Pursuing ultradeep oil and
sugarcane ethanol
www.petrobras.com.br/en
Founded:1953
Management: José Sergio
Gabrielli de Azevedo (CEO),
Carlos Tadeu da Costa Fraga
(executive manager for R&D)
Employees: 76,977
Revenues: $91.9 billion
R&D: $681.0 million
Market cap: $166.8 billion
Range
Resources
Tapping natural gas in shale
www.rangeresources.com
Founded:1976
Management: John Pinkerton
(CEO), Jeff Ventura (president
and COO)
Employees: 787
Revenues: $907.3 million
R&D: N/A
Market cap: $7.5 billion
Sasol
Turning coal and gas into
liquid fuels
www.sasol.com
Founded:1950
Management: Pat Davies
(CEO), Nolitha Fakude (execu-
tive director), Christine Ramon
(CFO)
Employees: 34,000
Revenues: $18.3 billion
R&D: $122.6 million
Market cap: $25.1 billion
Shell
Shifting focus from oil to natu-
ral gas
www.shell.com
Founded:1907
Management: Peter Voser
(CEO), Matthias Bichsel (direc-
tor of projects and technology),
Simon Henry (CFO)
Employees: 101,000
Revenues: $278.2 billion
R&D: $1.2 billion
Market cap: $160.4 billion
Total
Expanding markets in Africa
www.total.com
Founded:1924
Management: Christophe
de Margerie (CEO), Manoelle
Lepoutre (executive vice presi-
dent, sustainable development
and environment)
Employees: 96,387
Revenues: $157.0 billion
R&D: $910.0 million
Market cap: $120 billion
96 briefing
Sept10 Briefing Profiles.indd 96
Technology: Petrobras is using advanced technology to drill
wells off the coast of Brazil at depths of up to seven kilome-
ters. It is developing gas-to-liquids microreactors to turn
some of the natural gas that bubbles up from these offshore
wells (usually treated as a nuisance) into synthetic crude.
Market: In addition to its offshore drilling operations, the
company is a major producer and marketer of sugarcane-
based ethanol. Widespread use of flex-fuel vehicles in Bra-
zil has created huge domestic demand, but the company
is also hoping to quadruple its ethanol exports by 2013.
Strategy: Petrobras owns oil and gas wells throughout the
Technology: In 2004, Range Resources began the first com-
mercial drilling operations for natural gas at the huge Mar-
cellus shale bed. It drills horizontal wells, then flushes the
bores with water and chemicals at high pressure. As the
water is removed, trapped natural gas is released into pipes.
Market: With an estimated 489 trillion cubic feet of recov-
erable natural gas, the Marcellus shale is the second-largest
known deposit of natural gas in the world. If U.S. power
production shifts in the coming years from coal to natu-
ral gas, Range—which owns the rights to drill in 1.3 million
acres of Marcellus deposits—will be poised to capitalize.
Technology: This South African oil and gas company
started with a coal-to-liquids technology originally devel-
oped in Germany in the 1920s and created highly efficient
processes for turning coal and natural gas into synthetic
liquid fuels and a variety of chemicals. Market: Sasol has
initiated projects in markets that will see strong growth,
including India and China, where growing energy demand
cannot be met entirely by new oil production. Synthetic
fuels and products from more abundant coal resources can
fill the gap. Strategy: Sasol mines its own coal at one of the
world’s largest coal-to-liquids facilities in Secunda, South
Technology: For the past decade, Shell has been one of
the major players in extracting gas from nearly imperme-
able rock. Like other companies, it uses a technique called
hydrofracturing, which pushes water and chemicals into
the rock at high pressure in order to create a network of
cracks that help free the gas. This, combined with the ability
to drill horizontally, has allowed it to get at previously inac-
cessible resources. Market: The company, based in the U.K.
and the Netherlands, transports oil and liquefied natural gas
from its far-flung drilling sites to major markets in Europe,
Asia, and North America. Strategy: Shell is now focusing
Technology: Total, based in Paris, is a global producer,
refiner, and marketer of oil and natural gas. The company is
also starting to branch out into biofuels. Earlier this year it
invested an undisclosed amount in Coskata, a startup that
makes fuel from a variety of waste materials such as wood
chips, grass, and even old tires. It has also invested in battery
technology for storing large amounts of electricity from the
grid. Market: Total is one of the largest petroleum compa-
nies in Africa and has a strong position in the productive
natural-gas fields off the coast of Nigeria. Although most
of that gas is exported to wealthier countries, Total is also
world but is now focused on developing new oil fields off
Brazil’s southeastern coast, which could allow the country
to pass Venezuela and Mexico as the largest oil producer
in the Americas. Since it is also the world’s largest ethanol
producer, Brazil expects that soon it will no longer need to
import oil. Challenges and next steps: Although publicly
traded, Petrobras is state run, and Brazilian president Luiz
Inácio Lula da Silva recently issued new regulations on how
the company will be able to exploit its offshore reserves. The
Brazilian government is also drawing lessons from the BP
spill. A similar accident would be disastrous for tourism.
Strategy: Range Resources owns natural-gas drilling rights
in other regions, but for 2010 it has emphasized drilling
operations at the Marcellus deposits. The company hopes
to triple the number of wells drilled at the site, from 55 in
2009 to 150 by the end of this year. Challenges and next
steps: For power producers, coal still remains the cheapest
resource available, so the switch to natural gas is not inevi-
table. And with no refueling infrastructure for automobiles
powered by natural gas, car and truck manufacturers will
have little incentive to alter vehicle designs unless govern-
ment policies change.
Africa, and it’s developing gas-to-liquids projects in Africa,
the Middle East, and Australia. Sasol also complements its
coal- and gas-to-liquids programs with conventional crude-
oil production offshore of Gabon and refines imported oil.
Challenges and next steps: Although the fuel produced in
Sasol’s coal-to-liquids plants burns cleaner than oil, the pro-
duction process releases huge amounts of carbon dioxide.
The company’s Secunda plant is one of the world’s largest
point sources of carbon emissions. The company thinks
carbon capture and sequestration can eventually lessen the
environmental impact.
on gas exploration and production, and it expects that by
2012 it will produce more natural gas than crude oil for the
first time in its history. In May, the company acquired rights
to about half a million acres of the Marcellus shale, the vast
natural-gas reserve that stretches from New York to West
Virginia. Challenges and next steps: Although the poten-
tial of the Marcellus is huge, the long-term environmental
impact of hydrofracturing in the northeastern United States
is still unknown. Wells drilled by other companies have been
shut down amid environmental concerns, and Shell will
have to demonstrate the safety of its techniques.
active in the growing markets within Africa. Strategy: Total
has been especially forthright about the eventual end of oil
and has diversified into nuclear, solar, and alternative fuels.
But it is also well aware that oil and gas will continue to drive
economic growth, especially in the developing world, for
at least the next few decades. Challenges and next steps:
Total’s extensive holdings in Africa are under constant
threat from political and social instability. Earlier this year a
Total employee fell victim to one of a long string of kidnap-
pings that have plagued employees of foreign oil companies
across the region.
t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w s e p t e m b e r / o c t o b e r 2010
8/11/10 2:14 PM
 briefing: fuels

companies to watch: private

Amyris
Engineering microbes for
biofuels
www.amyris.com
Founders: Neil Renninger, Jack
D. Newman, Kinkead Reiling
Management: John Melo (CEO)
Funding: $244 million in pri-
vate funding
Key investors: Kleiner Perkins
Caufield and Byers, Khosla
Ventures, Votorantim Novos
Negocios, Advanced Equities
Technology: Employing the principles of synthetic biol-
ogy, which uses genetic engineering to overhaul an organ-
ism’s metabolic system, Amyris has designed microbes that
process sugar into biofuels and other chemicals. Market:
The company’s first commercial product, farnesene, can be
made into a number of chemicals and into industrial and
automotive oils and lubricants. Amyris plans to sell the mol-
ecule in specialty chemical markets in 2011. Its biodiesel has
the same properties as existing diesels and can therefore be
sold and distributed using existing infrastructure. Strategy:
Amyris’s first manufacturing plant is in Brazil, the world’s
most efficient producer of sugar. Using sugarcane instead
of more expensive corn sugars as a feedstock for biofuel and
chemical production will help keep costs low. The company
is working with Brazilian sugar and ethanol producers to
make use of existing facilities. Challenges and next steps:
Amyris still needs to show that it can produce chemicals
cheaply and in extremely large volumes. Amyris’s first pro-
duction facility—a joint venture with Usina São Martinho,
one of the Brazil’s largest ethanol producers—will come
online in 2012. Ultimately, the company will need a feed-
stock that’s widely available in the United States.

Coskata Technology: Biofuels are typically made either in chemi- for a specific feedstock. Strategy: Coskata will license its
Making ethanol from cellu- cal reactions or by fermenting sugars with the help of technology to other companies, such as established bio-
losic biomass and solid waste microbes. Coskata combines the two processes. Materi- fuel producers. It has developed a modular system with
www.coskata.com als such as wood chips and old tires are processed under elements that companies can mix and match according to
Founders: Todd Kimmel, high-temperature, high-pressure conditions to produce a their needs. In April, the company closed a major round
Rathin Datta, Aaron Mandell,
Andrew Perlman
mixture of hydrogen and carbon monoxide known as syn- of financing, led by French oil giant Total. Challenges and
Management: William Roe thesis gas. Then microörganisms raised in fermentation next steps: The company has shown that its technology
(CEO), Richard Tobey (VP, R&D) tanks or proprietary bioreactors developed by Coskata works at a demonstration plant but hasn’t yet established
Funding: Not disclosed turn the gas into ethanol. Market: Coskata’s process can that the organisms can produce fuels efficiently and inex-
Key investors: Total, GM,
Khosla Ventures, GreatPoint easily make fuel from a wide range of raw materials, so it pensively on a large scale. Plans for the first commercial-
Ventures should be marketable in more places than processes tuned scale plant are being finalized.

GreatPoint Technology: GreatPoint’s catalytic hydromethanation tech- dioxide captured in the process can be used in enhanced oil
nology converts coal (or other feedstocks, including bio- recovery. Strategy: GreatPoint aims to develop large-scale
Energy mass) into natural gas and hydrogen. It also produces pure production facilities globally, together with local partners.
Turning coal into natural gas
carbon dioxide. The process occurs in a single step and at a It is developing these projects near geological formations
www.greatpointenergy.com
Founders: Andrew Perlman, lower temperature than conventional gasification, resulting that are amenable to enhanced oil recovery. Concurrently,
Avi Goldberg, Aaron Mandell in higher efficiency and lower costs. Market: The natural gas GreatPoint will license its technology. Challenges and next
Management: Andrew Perl- produced through GreatPoint’s process can be transported steps: GreatPoint’s success depends on raising enough
man (CEO), Donald
Anthony (CTO) to major markets in pipelines for power generation, home financing and finding markets with sufficiently high
Funding: $150 million heating, and chemical production. Or it can be converted natural-gas prices and cheap feedstocks. It is pursuing sites
Key investors: AES, Dow into hydrogen, which can be used for power generation in China and in North America, and it’s evaluating partner-
Chemical, Peabody Energy or sold to refiners or fertilizer manufacturers. The carbon ships in India and the Middle East.

LS9 Technology: LS9 is engineering microbes to ferment bio- biles, and trucks. It also hopes to develop products for the
Making renewable mass and create a synthetic replacement for diesel fuel. chemical industry. Strategy: The company has tested its
hydrocarbons It is developing two processes: one that leads to biodiesel technology at a pilot plant in South San Francisco and
www.ls9.com made from fatty esters and another that produces hydro- plans to open a demonstration plant in Florida by the end
Founders: George Church, carbon molecules like those in petroleum-based diesel. of this year. LS9 is involved in a partnership with Procter
Chris Somerville
Management: Bill Haywood
The company has isolated naturally occurring genes and and Gamble, which supports the company and uses it as a
(CEO), Stephen del enzymes that produce hydrocarbons, transplanted them supplier of chemicals needed to manufacture its consumer
Cardayre (VP) into E. coli, and modified related genes and enzymes to products. Challenges and next steps: LS9 must secure the
Funding: $45 million increase their production of fuels. Market: LS9 hopes to funding to build plants, demonstrate the scalability of its
Key investors: Chevron, Flag-
ship Ventures break into the vast diesel market with a replacement for technology, and improve the productivity of its organisms
the petroleum-based products burned in jets, automo- to lower the costs of making fuels.

Mascoma Technology: Mascoma is researching efficient ways to Mascoma has a pilot facility in Rome, NY, and is planning
Wood to ethanol in one step commercially produce ethanol derived from cellulose. It is a commercial plant in Kinross, MI, which could produce
www.mascoma.com genetically engineering a microbe that, in one step, digests 80 million gallons of the fuel per year. The company is part-
Founders: Lee Lynd, Charles woody biomass to yield sugars and ferments the product nering with JM Longyear of Marquette, MI, to form a new
Wyman, Bob Johnsen into ethanol. This and other advances help decrease the company, Frontier Renewable Resources, which will own
Management: William J.
Brady (CEO), Michael R.
cost of making cellulosic biofuels by reducing the need for the Kinross project. Mascoma also expects to collaborate
Ladisch (CTO) the costly enzymes ordinarily used to break down cellulose with researchers at Michigan State and Michigan Techno-
Funding: $160 million into sugars. Market: As production of ethanol for vehicles logical University. Challenges and next steps: Like other
Key investors: Marathon Oil, increases in accordance with biofuels mandates, Masco- cellulosic-ethanol companies, Mascoma is still struggling
General Motors, Flagship Ven-
tures, Kleiner Perkins Caufield ma’s new cellulosic-ethanol facility could be a key player in to raise the funding—more than $100 million—required to
and Byers putting wood-based renewables on the market. Strategy: build its first commercial plant.

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 briefing: fuels
companies to watch: private
PetroTel
Information technology for
unlocking hard-to-reach oil
www.petrotel.com
Founder: Anil Chopra
Management: Anil Chopra
(chairman and CEO), Fred
I. Stalkup (VP, enhanced oil
recovery), Ram Agarwal (VP,
gas engineering)
Funding: Not disclosed
Key investors: Anil Chopra,
Marisol Chopra
Poet
Making cellulosic ethanol
from corn waste
www.poet.com
Founder: Jeff Broin
Management: Jeff Broin
(CEO), Mark Stowers (SVP,
science and technology)
Funding: Funded by revenue
Key investors: The 27 Poet
biorefineries are owned mostly
by investors who purchased
shares in a private offering.
Range Fuels
Wood chips to biofuel
www.rangefuels.com
Founder: Vinod Khosla
Management: David Aldous
(CEO), Kevin Biehle
(VP, production)
Funding: $156 million in gov-
ernment assistance and over
$100 million in series B ven-
ture capital
Key investors: Khosla Ven-
tures, Passport Capital
Rive Technology
Using catalysts to increase
fuel yield from oil
www.rivetechnology.com
Founders: Javier García-
Martínez, Lawrence Evans
Management: Lawrence
Evans (CEO), Larry Dight
(SVP, R&D)
Funding: $22.3 million in ven-
ture funding
Key investors: Charles River
Ventures, Nth Power
Solazyme
Fuels from engineered algae
www.solazyme.com
Founders: Jonathan S.
Wolfson, Harrison Dillon
Management: Jonathan S.
Wolfson (CEO), Harrison Dillon
(president and CTO)
Funding: $158 million in ven-
ture funding and grants
Key investors: Braemar
Energy Ventures, Lightspeed
Venture Partners
98 briefing
Sept10 Briefing Profiles.indd 98
Technology: PetroTel provides technologies for oil recovery
and for oil-field engineering, simulation, and characteriza-
tion. An affiliate, Plano Research, has developed simula-
tion tools and other software used worldwide by major
oil and gas companies. A combination of its technologies,
called the “digital oil field,” helps companies manage the
overwhelming flood of data coming from various oil-field
sensing, mapping, and monitoring technologies. The com-
pany also collaborates with capital market funds, helping
to evaluate financial models of potential resources. Mar-
ket: PetroTel’s services support petroleum companies in
Technology: In 2006, the company partnered with enzyme
maker Novozymes in a project aimed at reducing the cost
of enzymes required to break down cellulose. The high cost
of these enzymes been one of the major barriers to mak-
ing cellulosic ethanol cheaply. Market: Poet aims to serve
the market created by the U.S. Environmental Protection
Agency’s Renewable Fuel Standard, which requires that 36
billion gallons of renewable fuels be blended into fuel sup-
plies by 2022, almost 50 percent of them from cellulosic
sources. Strategy: Poet, already one of the largest corn etha-
nol producer in the United States, is now aiming to become
Technology: Range Fuels converts materials such as wood
chips and grasses into hydrogen and carbon monox-
ide gases using a two-step thermochemical process that
exposes the feedstocks to high temperatures, high pres-
sures, and steam. Proprietary inorganic catalysts convert
the gases into a combination of methanol and ethanol.
Market: The company has said that in large-scale produc-
tion it can compete with corn ethanol, currently the cheap-
est ethanol in the United States. If so, it will gain access
to the market for fuel additives, which is already satu-
rated by corn ethanol. If not, it will need to vie with other
Technology: The company has found a way to increase the
size of the pores in zeolite catalysts, which oil refineries use
in reactions that “crack” long-chain hydrocarbon molecules
into smaller fragments that can be used in transportation
fuels and other products. By enabling the catalysts to crack
larger molecules, the technology allows refiners to obtain
more fuel from a barrel of crude oil, make use of cheaper
sources, and reduce carbon dioxide emissions. The tech-
nology can be added to existing refineries. Market: Results
from a pilot plant suggest that Rive’s catalyst can increase
profits by 10 to 15 percent annually at a medium-sized refin-
Technology: Solazyme’s process, unlike others that use
algae to make biofuels, does not require its microörgan-
isms to be exposed to sunlight. Instead, the algae are kept
in the dark inside large fermentation chambers, where
they feed on sugars rather than making sugars through
photosynthesis. The algae, which can be grown at high
density inside such tanks, produce large amounts of oil.
This is later purified and then refined into fuel or biochem-
ical products. Market: Solazyme has engineered different
algae strains to produce different oils, which can be sold
to existing oil refineries to create renewable replacements
Southeast Asia, Russia, the Middle East, Africa, and North
and South America. These services include helping to
devise methods for obtaining hard-to-reach oil locked up
in existing oil fields. Strategy: The company takes advan-
tage of the fact that the oil industry is being forced to pursue
resources that are increasingly hard to find, produce, and
recover. Challenges and next steps: The petroleum market
is volatile and subject to changing government regulations.
To protect itself, PetroTel is diversifying through invest-
ments in solar and wind technology companies as well as oil
and gas companies.
the first commercial-scale producer of cellulosic ethanol. It
has an advantage over some competitors because it can start
with waste from its conventional ethanol plant. Challenges
and next steps: The company announced late last year that
it could produce cellulosic ethanol at $2.35 per gallon, and
it expects to bring the price below $2 per gallon before it
breaks ground next year on a commercial-scale plant that
will produce upwards of 25 million gallons per year. The
company says that even with the federal biofuels mandate,
loan guarantees from the Department of Energy could be
key to getting the first commercial plants built.
cellulosic-ethanol producers for new markets. Strategy:
Range Fuels is producing methanol at its first commercial-
scale plant and plans to produce ethanol there this fall. It
plans to expand production at that plant from just under
10 million gallons of fuel to 60 million gallons by 2013. It
is also evaluating new sites in the southeastern United
States. Challenges and next steps: Having started com-
mercial production after years of delays that the company
attributes to the financial downturn and lack of financ-
ing, it now faces the challenge of raising money to fund the
plant’s expansion.
ery, translating into a potential $15 billion of economic value
across the industry. The company is working on applying its
technology to other processes, including ones used in bio-
fuel production. Strategy: Rive plans to form partnerships
with existing catalyst manufacturers and jointly sell their
products to refiners. This model will allow it to focus on
developing technology and sales while existing suppliers do
the manufacturing. Challenges and next steps: The tech-
nology still needs to be proved in commercial trials, which
the company expects to begin later this year. It expects to
start selling its product in the second half of 2011.
for gasoline, diesel, and jet fuel. The algae can also make
oils for products such as cosmetics. Strategy: At the same
time as it develops its biofuels, the company is courting
manufacturers seeking to produce more environmentally
friendly versions of cosmetics and nutritional products.
Challenges and next steps: Solazyme recently received
$21.8 million in stimulus funding from the U.S. Depart-
ment of Energy to build a 300,000-gallon-per-year pilot
plant in Pennsylvania. It must deliver on contracts with the
U.S. Department of Defense to produce thousands of gal-
lons of jet and ship fuel derived from algae.
t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w s e p t e m b e r / o c t o b e r 2010
8/11/10 2:14 PM
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 reviews

reviews

e n e r gy less than $200 million to $4 billion. In other

Cash for Infrastructure cases, the DOE had to fund entirely new pro-
grams. The agency spent $350 million, for
A yeAr And A hAlf After the federAl stimulus bill instance, to start up the Advanced Research
budgeted $80 billion for new energy technologies, the
Project Agency–Energy (ARPA-E), which
investment is providing much-needed momentum for cleAn
tech. but whAt will hAppen when the money runs out? backs high-risk research projects. Despite
By DAv I D ROTM A n
the challenges, he expects the stimulus-
related spending to reach $14 billion in
2011 before dropping off to $9 billion in 2012.

S
cattered across a swath of Michigan meant to be a first step in creating “a com- Though President Obama and other sup-
that’s been devastated by the state’s prehensive strategy that will pave the way porters of the legislation justified much of
slowdown in automobile manufacturing, a toward a clean energy future for our coun- the spending as a way to create “green jobs”
half-dozen or so companies have begun con- try.” Remaking the nation’s energy infra- and thus stimulate the economy, many econ-
struction on facilities to build advanced bat- structure will, of course, take years. But a omists dismiss that idea. Even those who
teries for electric vehicles. In the Southwest, year and half after passage of the stimulus strongly support government investment in
two solar thermal plants, each supported legislation, it is worth asking whether the technology point out that any spending on
by more than a billion dollars in federal strategy is on track. Do the billions of fed- research and new energy sources will take
loan guarantees, will soon sprawl across eral dollars being spent on energy research years to produce economic growth. Daron
thousands of acres in the des- and commercialization really Acemoglu, an economist at MIT and a lead-
AmericAn
ert. From Hawaii to northern recovery And represent the beginning of a ing authority on the link between economic
Maine, ridgelines have begun reinvestment
comprehensive plan for a clean- productivity and innovation, says that while
Act of 2009
bristling with wind turbines, energy future? Or are they sim- he strongly favors increased federal support
BoulevArd of
made possible in part by gov- Broken dreAms ply piecemeal investments that for energy innovation on the grounds that we
Josh lerner
ernment funding. Princeton University will become irrelevant once fed- need new technologies to forestall climate
Enacted 18 months ago, the Press, 2009 eral incentives disappear? change, it is “a joke and totally misguided”
American Recovery Act is now A Business PlAn The U.S. Department of to think it will help solve the nation’s unem-
for AmericA’s
delivering $80 billion in loan energy future Energy, which alone controls ployment problem.
guarantees, tax credits, and American energy $36.7 billion from the stimu- The real value of the stimulus spending
innovation council
cash grants to projects aimed June 10, 2010 lus bill, is now spending from has always been in its potential to compen-
at developing and deploying $800 million to $1 billion of sate for years of declining investment in
energy technologies. Speaking in mid- that money every month on R&D and the energy R&D and to jump-start commercial
July at a ground-breaking ceremony for commercialization of new energy projects, use of cleaner energy technologies despite
an advanced battery factory in Holland, according to Steve Isakowitz, the agency’s that long decline. The United States spends
MI, President Obama promised that the chief financial officer. In a recent interview, shockingly little on energy research. In that
plant would be “a boost to the economy of Isakowitz said it has been a “huge challenge” context, the stimulus bill provided a much-
the entire region.” But beyond spurring new to spend the money quickly and efficiently. needed boost by allocating $3 billion for
jobs in clean energy, the Obama adminis- Some programs have been expanded sig- energy R&D, including the creation of
tration says, the unprecedented injection nificantly: spending on modernization of ARPA-E and a series of research centers
of federal money into the energy sector is the electric grid, for example, soared from around the country. But by far the largest

100 reviews t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w s e p t e m b e r / o c t o b e r 2010

Sept10 Reviews.indd 100 8/10/10 11:08 AM

 Changing landsCape Construction is
under way in Holland, mi, on a factory to make
advanced batteries for electric cars. it is just one
of many energy-related projects made possible
by funding from last year’s stimulus bill.
energy expenditures in the stimulus bill sup-
port the demonstration and commercializa-
tion of new technologies. Loan guarantees,
tax credits, and cash grants will supply tens
of billions of dollars to advanced battery
factories, solar power plants, and biofuel
refineries (see “Taking Stock of the Stimu-
lus,” p. 28)—large speculative projects for
which tight credit and depressed financial
markets would have made private funding
nearly impossible.
These are fragile gains, however. The
benefit of increased R&D spending will
depend on whether future funding levels
remain high or suddenly drop again. Like-
wise, the fate of the new commercial projects
will depend on what happens when federal
funding winds down; many of the projects
will not, at least in the short term, thrive with-
out various government incentives. For the
federal spending to have a lasting impact,
the stimulus bill will have to be followed by
a practical plan for energy innovation and
adam b i r d/ r e d u x
investment. And as budget hawks in Wash-
ington begin to tear apart federal expen-
ditures, any sustainable energy policy will
w w w . t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w . c o m
Sept10 Reviews.indd 101
need to justify its government funding in
terms of direct, clearly recognizable benefits.
No Data
One challenge in designing a practical plan
for energy innovation—and convincing pol-
iticians and the public of its value—is that
no one really knows how to quantify the
economic benefits of scientific research.
Over the last several decades, economists
have convincingly documented how inno-
vation can increase productivity and, thus,
economic growth. But little is known about
how research leads to innovation or what
kind of research is most effective. “The
link between R&D and economic impact
just doesn’t exist on the micro level,” says
Julia Lane, director of the Science of Sci-
ence and Innovation Policy program at
the National Science Foundation. Lane
and colleagues at the National Institutes
of Health have begun to study the impact
of the research spending called for in the
stimulus bill. Initially, the group will sim-
ply track stimulus-funded R&D, collect-
ing data on how different disciplines are
funded and how many jobs are created. In
a second, more ambitious phase of the proj-
ect, they will try to find new ways to quan-
tify the economic, scientific, and social
effects of the research over time.
Few in the scientific community doubt
the value of federal support for research, but
politicians are not so united. Lane says that
if scientists can’t demonstrate the impact of
their research more clearly, the funding will
be in jeopardy. “We ought to be able to have
some sense of what investments [in R&D]
to make,” she says. It’s hard to make such
policy decisions now, she adds, because
“the data on how scientific ideas are created,
transmitted, and adopted are limited.”
There is, however, plenty of evidence
that government funding and policy deci-
sions can, if done correctly, create an envi-
ronment conducive to innovation. But as
Harvard Business School professor Josh
Lerner suggests in his recent book Boule-
vard of Broken Dreams: Why Public Efforts to
Boost Entrepreneurship and Venture Capital
Have Failed—and What to Do About It, gov-
ernment efforts to promote new businesses
have a decidedly mixed record. There have
been great successes—Lerner describes, for
example, the critical role that government
involvement played in the early days of Sili-
con Valley—and dismal failures, such as a
program by the Malaysian government to
establish a biotechnology zone in what is
now known as “the valley of bio-ghosts.”
Lerner’s book doesn’t directly address
energy innovation, but the author shows
reviews 101
8/10/10 5:54 PM
 reviews
how important venture capital and entre-
preneurship are in realizing the potential
of new technologies—and he makes a con-
vincing case that government can encour-
age these activities.
In a recent interview, Lerner said it is
too early to grade the success of the energy
spending in the stimulus bill, but he worries
that the U.S. government has repeated the
mistakes of others. In particular, he says,
by making large investments in a relatively
few companies, federal agencies such as
the DOE have effectively picked winners.
A better approach, he suggests, might have
been to distribute smaller amounts to more
companies and “listen to the market” by
linking the government investment to such
factors as how much private investment a
startup has raised. Regardless of such con-
cerns, though, Lerner stresses that govern-
ment support for new technologies is crucial.
“The government certainly has a role to play
in both financing and creating an environ-
ment that is conducive to energy-related
entrepreneurial activity,” he says. “But it
needs to be done right.”
Big Bucks
Over the last several years, a plethora of
books, academic papers, and expert reports
have proposed ways to formulate a coher-
ent strategy for energy innovation. notably,
in June the American Energy Innovation
Council (AEIC), a Washington-based
group of industry executives, issued a
“business plan for America’s energy future,”
signed by, among others, Microsoft chair-
man Bill Gates, GE CEO Jeffrey Immelt,
and Xerox CEO Ursula Burns. The report
calls for tripling annual federal support of
what it terms research, development, and
deployment (RD&D), from the current $5
billion to $16 billion, of which $1 billion
would go to ARPA-E. The business lead-
ers also call for a “national energy strategy
board” that should be “external to the U.S.
government” and would be charged with
supervising an “independent corporation
outside of the federal government” that
102 reviews
Sept10 Reviews.indd 102
would help commercialize new energy
projects. In their plan, this corporation
would receive $20 billion over 10 years
through a single federal appropriation.
It’s to the business leaders’ credit that
they recognize the importance of govern-
ment support for energy innovation and
the need for “a national energy strategy.”
nonetheless, this is politically volatile stuff.
The American public, and many politicians,
are likely to have little appetite for the pros-
pect of quasi-public corporations or “expert
boards” running the nation’s energy policy.
Meanwhile, any comprehensive plan
for energy innovation will need to deal
with a simple technology fact: most exist-
ing alternatives to fossil fuels are currently
too expensive to replace them to any sig-
nificant degree. And yet the transition to
lower-carbon fuels must begin immedi-
ately if the direst effects of global warming
are to be avoided. Many economists favor
carbon pricing, in the form of a direct car-
bon tax or a cap-and-trade system; either
would effectively force companies to pay for
carbon pollution, raising the cost of fossil
fuels and making alternatives more competi-
tive. But even some of the strongest advo-
cates of carbon pricing acknowledge that,
as Harvard economist Robert Stavins said
in a recent interview, it is “essential but not
sufficient.” In other words, we’ll still need
energy innovation.
Of course, an “energy miracle” is always
possible (see Q&A, p. 30), but to count on a
radical breakthrough is to ignore the imme-
diacy of global warming—and the amount of
time it takes to fully commercialize energy
technologies. A technology that’s still in a
researcher’s lab or on a venture capitalist’s
whiteboard is at least a few decades from
making a major impact on climate change.
If the climate scientists are right, any such
solution will be too little, too late.
To reduce carbon dioxide emissions
during the coming decades, “it’s all about
large-scale deployment of low-carbon tech-
nologies,” says Richard Lester, the founding
director of MIT’s Industrial Performance
Center and head of its nuclear science and
engineering department, who has spent
the last several years on a project to design
a more effective energy innovation system.
The problem, he says, is that “those tech-
nologies today are too costly.”
One of the central questions in formulat-
ing an effective innovation strategy, Lester
says, is how to “bridge the cost gap” between
cheap fossil fuels and more expensive low-
carbon energy sources. “Our conclusion is
that there is no possibility of financing this
cost gap in the early stage of deployment of
these new technologies with the traditional
federal budget appropriations process,” he
says. “It is just too expensive.” Lester adds,
“It really makes sense for the users to pay for
it. That will be very unpopular, but I don’t
see any way to proceed otherwise.”
The good news is that innovation can
bring down the cost of new energy tech-
nologies. One of the virtues of the stimulus
bill is that it allocates money both to energy
research and to deployment; its most cre-
ative programs, such as ARPA-E, attempt to
combine those objectives. But the success
of these investments will be determined by
whether they actually turn out to be the ini-
tial stages of a comprehensive energy plan.
Formulating such a plan will mean studying
the growing body of academic research on
the most effective ways to encourage inno-
vation. It will mean making some unpopular
choices, and it will be expensive.
A year and a half after the stimulus
funding began, the mood in Washington
has turned frugal. The DOE’s proposed
budget for 2011 does request increases for
energy R&D, but there’s little talk of spend-
ing additional tens of billions of dollars to
support the demonstration of new energy
technologies. Without such investments, the
projects that got their start with stimulus
funding could languish. Rather than lay-
ing the foundation for a new energy infra-
structure, they will continue to represent
mere possibilities for clean technology.
dAvid rotmAn is Technology Review’s editor.
t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w s e p t e m b e r / o c t o b e r 2010
8/10/10 11:08 AM
 reviews

to share data files over the Internet. This

technology provided the world with unlim-
ited free music, much to the dismay of the
giant music publishers. But it was still some-
what clunky. If you wanted to watch a video,
you had to download it, which took time
and ate up space on your hard drive.
By 2005, the BitTorrent technology gave
way to something more manageable and
user-friendly: streaming video. This technol-
ogy was used early and heavily by sites with
names like PornHub, Xvideos, and YouPorn.
Suddenly, anybody who wanted to watch a
clip could do so almost instantly. You clicked
on a video and it played in the browser: no
more waiting, no more downloading.
This simple innovation has demolished
the porn industry’s traditional way of doing
business. Porn tube sites are now among the
most visited websites in the world. According
i nte r n et to the online measurement company Alexa,

Down the Tubes PornHub holds a worldwide traffic rank of

54. Xvideos is at number 53, and YouPorn is
how free streaming video threatens the porn industry. at number 64. The threat comes from the
By Sc OTT FAYN ER sheer ease of uploading content—anyone’s
content—onto a site and then drawing users
to view it. Most tubes describe themselves as
Editor’s note: The following review is about The shift worked to my benefit—my aggregators of “user-generated content,” but
pornography. If the subject itself offends, please bosses created an online division and put the material they publish is much broader—
stop reading. Why write about it? First, because me in charge of its editorial side. From that many video clips are created, paid for, and
pornography is “intimately linked with the evo- perch I saw firsthand how changing tech- owned by porn studios.
lution of communications technology,” as one nologies both benefited and wounded the “Piracy has hurt us a lot,” says Ali Joone,
history professor interviewed puts it. Second, mighty porn machine. When I joined Flynt, founder and director of the adult-film
because the porn industry, like the music and it produced 20 magazines and four web- company Digital Playground, which last
newspaper industries, faces a technological sites; today, it produces a handful of maga- year tracked illegal downloads of its most
problem and doesn’t know what zines and dozens of websites. popular title, Pirates. “Over the course of a
to do next. www.porNhub.com Smaller companies gained month, it was downloaded about four mil-
www.xviDeos.com power, since it was cheaper lion times. And that’s just from a handful

I
www.youporN.com
was 29 and had been living in to put material online than to of sites. Even if those downloads cost us a
Los Angeles for nine months package and distribute mag- thousand customers, let’s say, who were
when I took a job with Larry Flynt Publica- azines, tapes, or DVDs. And in the most going to pay—that hurts.”
tions. Technology was the last thing on my wide-reaching development, high-speed The porn studios face the same funda-
mind, but that would change quickly. The Internet has spawned something called tube mental question as any content provider in
most famous of the 20 magazines under the sites—file-hosting sites that offer rivers of the Internet age: how do you protect your
roof was Hustler, the raunchiest of the three free streaming video. These sites threaten stuff once it’s “out there”? The answer, so
big American skin mags. But within a year to undo porn as we’ve known it. far, is, “Not well.”
of my arrival, in 2000, some of the less popu- The troubles for the porn studios began The tube effect has been profound enough
p ete r ar k le

lar titles folded, and it was clear that a shift with a technology called BitTorrent, intro- to inspire a recent public-service announce-
was in the air. duced in 2001, which made it easy for people ment featuring more than a dozen adult per-

w w w . t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w . c o m reviews 103

Sept10 Reviews.indd 103 8/10/10 5:54 PM

 reviews
formers and directors pleading with fans not
to view pirated porn. One actress, charley
chase (who did not participate in the PSA
but says she faces the same troubles), got
into the business in late 2007 on the promise
of lots of work at high pay. But the pay has
dropped and the work has dried up. “And
it’s all because of piracy,” she says.
According to Travis Nestor, a former
agent for and a founder of the now-defunct
It Models, a scene that might have paid an
actress $900 in 2004 will now net her $600.
In the same period, rates for male performers
have dropped from around $500 per scene to
$300. But that’s only half the effect, because
there are fewer studios making fewer movies.
Joone says that five years ago the industry
might have released 400 new titles a week,
but that output has been cut in half. “People
just aren’t buying,” he says.
“even without porn, we’d probably all
have high-speed internet, but it would
have been adopted more slowly, in
the same way that the spread of the
vCr would have been delayed if porn
weren’t around, beCause the early
adopters wouldn’t be there.”
It’s difficult even for people in the indus-
try to get a sense of how many studios have
closed, partly because the porn business—
unlike, say, the music business—does not
consist of large conglomerates. Instead,
it’s made up of shifting constellations of
modest-sized companies. Diane Duke, exec-
utive director of the Free Speech coalition, a
trade association for the adult entertainment
industry, says the number of studios is still
in the thousands (representing everything
from big production houses to “mom-and-
pop shops”), but it’s dropping. “Our industry
is woefully lacking in stats,” she says. “Every-
body keeps their numbers tight to their chest.
But we’ve definitely seen the decline.”
The tube sites, meanwhile, find shelter in
the Digital Millennium copyright Act, a U.S.
law passed in 1998. The act says that web-
104 reviews
Sept10 Reviews.indd 104
sites aren’t responsible for any copyrighted
material that shows up on their pages unless
somebody points it out to them. “But that
only protects them up to the point that they
receive a cease-and-desist letter from us,”
says Joone. “Then they have to take it down.
If they don’t take it down, then that’s copy-
right infringement.”
For the tube operators, the risks have
been worth it. “Most of the time, the tube
sites are just two or three people,” Joone says.
“They haven’t paid for the content. The only
expense they have is bandwidth, and then
they have advertisers paying them a lot of
money for the traffic they’re creating.” Joone
says a typical tube site might pull in several
hundred thousand dollars every month.
One defense against the tube sites is “spi-
der” technology. Spiders, or Web crawlers,
are employed by search engines to index site
pages. In the porn world, a spider could find
stolen content hiding anywhere in cyber-
space. But it’s an exhausting effort, and the
results are weak at best. “Even with spiders,
we aren’t winning,” says Los Angeles–based
adult-film director Jonni Darkko. “Most of
the tube sites are run out of foreign coun-
tries, so there’s not much we can do to them.
Plus, if they receive an order to remove a
pirated scene, instead of taking it down,
what they’ll do is just change the title and
put it somewhere else on the page.”
There have been a few lawsuits for copy-
right infringement in the porn world. In
April, adult actress Vicky Vette filed a law-
suit against the file-hosting site RapidShare
for allowing her content to be given away.
Vette told me she has no idea if she can win
but felt she needed to draw a line in the sand.
“We have to try and stand up now,” she says,
“or an entire generation of surfers is going
to think it is ridiculous to pay for anything.”
Joone acknowledges that it’s been a bit
of a “cat-and-mouse game.” But he says the
tube sites are a technology problem with a
technological solution—in this case, some-
thing called digital fingerprinting. “We’ve
been using it for the last two months, and
we’ve targeted about 10 tube sites with it,”
he says. The technology essentially “ingests”
a film, Joone says: “Be it one frame, be it
10 minutes—it can find it, and what it does
then is send an automatic cease-and-desist
takedown notice. And then it checks back
every two hours to make sure it’s been taken
down. And it will log that clip for legal pur-
poses.” He’s confident that this technology
will provide enough evidence to make law-
suits effective where they haven’t been in
the past. “We do have a consortium of adult
producers that right now, behind the scenes,
are taking a tube site to court,” he says.
All this back-and-forth between the porn
studios and the tube sites is just the latest
episode in a relationship between porn and
technology that goes back at least to the
printing press. And the rise of the tubes is
hardly the first time technology has over-
turned pornography’s established modes
of business. The Polaroid camera, the VcR,
pay-per-view, 900 numbers, live chat, video
chat, and high-speed broadband all got early
exposure as porn delivery systems. As a
result, porn has been normalizing the use
of new technologies for a long time.
“Things like the book or the motion pic-
ture weren’t invented with the idea of ‘Oh,
let’s make pornography with this,’ ” says
Jonathan coopersmith, a history profes-
sor at Texas A&M who has studied the porn
industry for more than a decade. But porn
“quickly becomes a tool for diffusing knowl-
edge of how these new things work, and it
creates an early market,” he says. “Even with-
out porn, we’d probably all have high-speed
Internet, but it would have been adopted
more slowly, in the same way that the spread
of the VcR would have been delayed if porn
t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w s e p t e m b e r / o c t o b e r 2010
8/10/10 5:54 PM

weren’t around, because the early adopters
wouldn’t be there.”
Diane Duke thinks the tube sites and the
porn studios will ultimately learn to work
together, because it’s in both their interests.
The tube sites won’t want to deal with law-
suits, and the studios won’t be able to say
no to all those additional page views. Duke
envisions a system in which a clip on a tube
site would link to a pay site, allowing view-
ers to buy more scenes or the whole movie.
The tube site would get a cut of any purchase.
Duke says people focus on the fact
that the tube sites are free, but they’ve got
another advantage—they make it quick and
easy for people to access clips. She says the
porn studios must create a pay model that
doesn’t make the customer feel it’s a hassle
to hand over a few dollars in exchange for
a scene and that allows the source of the
charge to be disguised. She imagines some-
thing like iTunes, with movies broken into
chunks sold like individual songs.
If these options don’t work, there’s
always another: some porn producers are
buying up tube sites themselves. Other pro-
ducers are building new tubes, giving away
quick clips of their own movies in the hope
that advertising revenues and site mem-
berships (offering higher quality and full-
length clips) will make up for their losses
in the DvD market.
Joone says the companies that thrive will
find a way to offer something that people
think is worth paying for. Digital Play-
ground, he believes, has survived in part
because it caters to the couples market. Such
customers, he says, want decent produc-
tion values and at least some kind of story;
they’re much less likely to be satisfied by a
series of disjointed clips on a tube site. But
he also acknowledges that the tubes aren’t
going anywhere anytime soon.
“If you just want something to look at, you
can get that for free,” he says. “You can get
that from now until the end of your life.”
scott fAyner rAn the populAr gossip site
luke ford.com, covering the porn industry.
todAy he publishes A monthly online mAgAzine
dedicAted to boston dogs, cAlled mAssArf.
w w w . t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w . c o m
Untitled-1 1
Sept10 Reviews.indd 105
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8/2/2010 12:46:49 PM
8/10/10 11:08 AM
 hack B onBoard dIagnostIcs port

U.S. law mandates an onboard diagnostics port,

which is located under the dashboard in most cars.
The researchers gain access to the car’s computer
B systems by plugging into it.

a computerIzed systems

A typical luxury sedan contains 50 to 100

computers controlled by over 100 mega-
bytes of code. Most of these computers
communicate over a shared internal network.
These systems have surprising intercon-
nections that attackers could exploit, the
researchers say. For example, in many cars,
the door locking system and the crash
detection system are linked. That means an
attacker who takes over the locks may get
access to key internal systems.

Taking Over a Car

researchers “Break In”
wIth software and a laptop

By E r i ca N ao N E

cars arE bEcomiNg more com-

puterized, an evolution that could C communIcatIons caBle

have an unintended side effect: vul-

nerability to attacks. researchers at
the University of Washington and
the University of california, san
Diego, led by Tadayoshi Kohno and
stefan savage, recently showed
that by taking over a car’s comput-
The researchers used this cable to connect to
the car’s high-speed communications network,
which contains the engine control module, the
electronic brake control module, and the trans-
mission control module. The car uses a protocol
that enables all these components to commu-
nicate with each other. The cable converts data
KAr l Ko S c h e r, Ale x e i c z e S K i S, An d F rAn z i r o e S n e r

sent using this protocol to a USB signal that can

be received by an ordinary laptop.
ers, they could disable the brakes,
stop the engine, and control the door
locks. For now, most of the attacks
require access to a port inside the car.
but wreaking havoc could get easier
as carmakers add more wireless con-
nectivity. The researchers hope their
work will motivate manufacturers to
add security features.

106 hack t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w s e p t e m b e r / o c t o b e r 2010

Sept10 Hack.indd 106 8/10/10 6:02 PM

 a

D custom-BuIlt connectIon

A low-speed network connects less critical parts

of the car’s computer system, such as the air con-
ditioning, the radio, and the theft deterrent module,
which prevents the car from starting without a
legitimate key. The researchers loaded their own
code onto a circuit board, which was then able to
translate between the laptop and the car’s systems.

E carshark Interface

C The researchers developed a custom “carShark”

interface—which can run on an ordinary laptop—
to track and control the messages that various E
computer systems send each other over the car’s
networks. They executed their attacks through this
D
interface, and in some cases they sent it wireless
commands from a nearby car.

w w w . t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w . c o m hack 107

Sept10 Hack.indd 107 8/9/10 6:58 PM

 demo
demo
How to Remake Life
Venter InstItute researchers haVe made the FIrst
VIable cell wIth a synthetIc Genome.
By k AT h e R I N e B o URzAC
W
ith a precise motion, Li Ma, a techni-
cian at the J. Craig Venter Institute
in Rockville, MD, pipettes a cherry-red
solution of bacterial cells into a vial that
contains a clear solution of fragile DNA
loops. These loops, the largest pieces of
DNA ever assembled in the lab, are each
capable of controlling all the ordinary
functions of a cell. But the DNA didn’t
originate in any bacteria: instead, scien-
tists pieced it together from bottled chemi-
cals. The process they recently developed
for doing this is the first to yield synthetic
cells that are capable of surviving. Some of
the bacterial cells that Ma is working with
will fuse together in the solution, engulfing
the synthetic genome and then replicating
and living under its control.
Conventional genetic engineering is a
lengthy process in which genes are altered
one by one, often over successive genera-
tions of organisms. That makes radically
changing a genome a daunting proposition.
But the newly developed techniques allow
researchers to edit genomes on a computer,
subtracting or adding genes by literally cut-
ting and pasting them in a file. It’s more like
108 demo
Sept10 Demo.indd 108
word processing than the traditional lab
work involved in culturing and screening
generations of organisms. The research-
ers can then perform the genetic equiva- 2
lent of printing out the file, at which point
they’re able to transplant the result—a new
genome—into existing cells. These steps
dramatically speed up the engineering pro-
cess; it might take just weeks to complete
experiments that previously would have
taken months or years.
Ultimately, researchers want to use syn-
thetic biology to design microbes that very
efficiently produce vaccines, clean fuels,
and other products. But they can’t engineer
new genomes from scratch, because they
don’t yet know enough about what genes
and networks of genes are needed to sus-
tain life and produce a desired product.
“You might remove one gene and the cell
lives; remove a second and it dies; then
remove a third and it lives again,” says
Daniel Gibson, an associate professor at work by rapidly deleting and adding genes
the institute. Thus, the Venter researchers in different combinations, incorporating
are experimenting with the sequence of a the new genomes into cells, and then
naturally occurring genome. They hope observing how those genomes function
to learn more about how genomes and cells or fail to function.
t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w s e p t e m b e r / o c t o b e r 2010
7/30/10 11:55 AM
 4

1. A modified version of the gene sequence for the bacterium M.

mycoides is shown here on a computer display. Researchers have
deleted genes and added watermark sequences. They use software
to divide the sequence into 1,100 pieces.
2. This stack of containers stores fragments of synthesized DNA that,
when joined together, will form the entire bacterial genome. Each
container has multiple wells, each of which contains copies of one
section of the genome.
3. Researcher Daniel Gibson combines a mixture of 10 consecu-
tive DNA fragments with yeast cells that will stitch them together in
the correct order, forming a circle of DNA. The stitching process is
repeated until the yeast have assembled the complete genome.
4. Multiple yeast colonies bearing synthetic DNA are smeared on
petri dishes that are numbered to identify which part of the synthetic
genome they carry.

Genetic Revision
The process starts on the computer, where
Gibson pulls up the genome of the bacte-
rium Mycoplasma mycoides. It’s a relatively
simple one, comprising just 1,078,809
DNA base pairs that make up about 900
genes. (In comparison, E. coli bacteria have
about 4,400 genes.) Gibson and his col-
leagues have made a few changes: they’ve
deleted 14 genes from the sequence and
added others. To create a watermark dis-
tinguishing their creation, they developed
a code that converts English into the four-
letter alphabet of DNA and used it to mod-
ify the genome, incorporating their names,
a URL, a few sentences, and an e-mail
address into the genome.
Gibson’s group then uses software to
divide the modified genome into 1,100 sec-
tions, each about 1,080 base pairs long—a
RyAN D o N N E ll
together stretches of DNA from individ-
ual base pairs supplied in bottled solutions.
Finally, the researchers enlist yeast cells to
stitch these long sections together, a job
that machines can’t do.
Gibson kneels in front of a refrigera-
tor in the lab and pulls out 12 plastic boxes,
each of which contains 96 wells full of DNA
fragments based on the computer-modified
designs. He stacks them on a bench and
says, “This is the entire genome in 1,100
pieces.” Gibson uses a pipette to gather
10 fragments in order and adds them to a
tiny plastic tube, along with an additional
fragment of DNA that will help pull the
sequence together into a loop. Next he adds
yeast cells that have been treated to allow
them to take up the DNA pieces. “Each yeast
cell thinks these pieces of DNA are part of
its own chromosome, and it’s broken,” he
ments so that the ones to be linked together
have ends with matching sequences. The
yeast pieces the 10 fragments together by
matching these sequences to produce DNA
loops that are each 10,000 base pairs long.
Repeating the process links the 10,000-base-
pair sequences to form 100,000-base-pair
segments of the genome. After a third pool-
ing step, the yeast have stitched together
the entire synthetic genome. Using estab-
lished methods, the synthetic genomes are
extracted from the yeast.
Handling the extracted DNA takes con-
siderable care: even a small genome is a
gigantic, fragile molecule. “It’s going to break
into 100 pieces if you just look at it wrong,”
Gibson says. If it were suspended in a liq-
uid solution, the DNA could be destroyed
merely by the movement of the liquid. So
Gibson immobilizes the genomes in aga-

size that can be made economically with says. “It wants to put them back together.” rose, an algae-derived gel commonly used
a DNA synthesizer, a machine that pieces The researchers designed the DNA frag- as a medium for microbes. Enclosed in this

w w w . t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w . c o m demo 109

Sept10 Demo.indd 109 8/5/10 12:57 PM

 demo
protective pellet, they can safely be stored
until the researchers are ready to transplant
them into recipient cells.
tiny tRansplant
In a lab down the hall, Ma has prepared the
cells that will receive the new sequence: a
species of bacteria called Mycoplasma
capricolum that’s closely related to the spe-
cies from which the synthetic genome is
derived. While an enzyme that degrades
agarose liquefies DNA-containing pel-
lets in one test tube, Ma gets another test
tube and mixes the bacteria with calcium
chloride and polyethylene glycol, a cock-
tail that the researchers believe makes the
cells’ surfaces malleable and sticky. Now
it’s a matter of chance and a steady hand.
Ma pipettes some of the cell mixture into
the vial containing the synthetic genome
loops. The sticky cells begin fusing with
one another. To maintain their spherical
shape after fusion, they must take in vol-
ume from the solution around them. As
this happens, some cells—about one in
100,000—also take in the synthetic genome.
The result is a sort of supercell with three
genomes—the synthetic genome and one
from each of the two cells. The supercell
then divides into three smaller cells, one
of which contains the synthetic genome.
Ma smears the cell solution on culture
plates containing an antibiotic to which
only cells with the synthetic genome are
110 demo
Sept10 Demo.indd 110
7
resistant (during the genome editing pro-
cess, the researchers added a gene that
makes them impervious to it). Those cells
will live, growing and dividing under the
control of the new genome. The rest die
off, leaving behind a pure colony of syn-
thetic cells.
The next step for the Venter Institute
researchers is to use their genomic editing,
synthesizing, and transplanting techniques
to design and test genomes with fewer and
fewer genes. The goal is to create a “minimal”
cell—one with only the genes it needs to sur-
vive. Such a cell could be easier than a natural
one to alter through genetic engineering.
Watch Venter Institute researchers
www synthesize a genome:
technologyreview.com/demo
5. Multiple copies of the completed synthetic
genome are encased in agarose gel inside this
tube. The gel immobilizes and protects the frag-
ile DNA loops.
6. Researcher li Ma mixes bacterial cells with
copies of the synthetic genome. This must be
done gently to avoid breaking the DNA. The
mixture sits in an incubator for three hours. The
cells have been treated to encourage them to
fuse together; as they do, some of them encap-
sulate a synthetic genome that had been float-
ing in the surrounding solution.
7. A solution of cells, some of which contain the
new genome, is mixed with a gel-based culture
medium that contains an antibiotic. Then it’s
poured into petri dishes and put into an incubator.
only cells containing the synthetic genome carry
a gene that protects them from the antibiotic.
The blue spots are colonies of bacteria now con-
trolled by the transplanted synthetic genome.
The researchers’ methods are cur-
rently very expensive: it costs $300,000 to
$500,000 to make and transplant a synthetic
genome if the researchers synthesize the
DNA in house, or about three times that
much if they purchase it from an outside
supplier. Yet the price of DNA synthesis
is falling and may continue to decline even
further as demand increases and technology
improves. If that happens and the genome-
building techniques prove as useful as the
Venter researchers hope they will, more
people will begin to adopt their methods,
says James Collins, a professor of biomedi-
cal engineering at Boston University.
“This is a significant advance for synthetic
biology,” Collins says. “Now we’ve got to see,
RyAN D o N N E ll
what are the changes that can be introduced
to the genome?”
t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w s e p t e m b e r / o c t o b e r 2010
7/30/10 11:55 AM
 It Pays to Know Your Planet
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 from the labS
biomedicine
Growing
New Livers
Scaffold from
damaged organS
may provide the
baSiS for new oneS
Source: “organ reengineering
through development of a
tranSplantable recellular-
ized liver graft uSing
decellularized liver matrix”
basak uygun et al.
Nature Medicine 16: 814–820
results: Researchers at Mas-
sachusetts General Hospital,
in Boston, grew new livers by
removing the cells from an
existing rat liver and seeding
the scaffold left behind with
healthy liver cells. The new
112 from the labs
Sept10 FromTheLabs.indd 112
organs were able to function
for a short time when trans-
planted into rats.
Why it matters: Not enough
donor livers are available for
everyone who needs one, and
the organ’s complex three-
dimensional structure has
made generating replace-
ments very difficult. The
research could one day pro-
vide a way to use unhealthy
organs to grow healthy ones.
methods: Scientists used
a detergent to remove cells
from the existing liver, leav-
ing a scaffold of proteins and
other molecules. The basic
architecture of the liver’s com-
plex network of blood vessels
remained intact. To the empty
scaffold, the researchers added
a mixture of liver cells and
endothelial cells, the cells that
line blood vessels. The cells
grew into an almost complete
organ that functioned for 10
days in a dish and for up to
eight hours in live animals.
next steps: The researchers
plan to transplant the organs
into rats for longer periods
to see if they might function
well enough to replace a dam-
aged liver. This will require
adding more endothelial cells,
because the current recon-
structed livers don’t have
enough blood vessels to work
properly for long. The team
is also experimenting with
using stem cells rather than
liver cells to populate the scaf-
fold, which could potentially
enable patients to use their
own cells.
liver Scaffold the net-
work of blood vessels in a decellu-
larized liver (left) looks the same as
that in a normal one (right).
t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w s e p t e m b e r / o c t o b e r 2010
Cheap
Blood Typing
a 10-cent paper
teSt could improve
medical care in
poor countrieS
Source: “paper diagnoStic for
inStantaneouS blood typing”
gil garnier et al.
Analytical Chemistry 82(10): 4158–4164
results: Researchers made
a blood-typing test from a
piece of paper treated with
antibodies. It can determine
an individual’s blood type as
accurately as more complex
existing methods.
Why it matters: Blood trans-
fusions can cause a potentially
fatal reaction if the recipi-
ent’s and donor’s blood types
conflict. Current methods
of determining blood type
require costly machinery,
which is often difficult to
obtain or maintain in poor
countries. The new test costs
about 10 cents to make.
methods: Using an ink-jet
printer, researchers printed a
B.E. Uyg U n an d O.B. U sta
8/2/10 1:34 PM
 a pattern of channels on
paper with hydrophobic ink.
Then they used the printer to
deposit antibodies designed
to bind to specific molecules
associated with the differ-
ent blood types. On each of
three tabs extending from the
center of a piece of paper, they
printed a different antibody
within the channels. Blood
dropped into the center dif-
fuses along the tabs and stops
when it encounters the anti-
body that matches the mol-
ecule characteristic of its type.
Scientists read the results by
assessing how far the blood
has traveled down the tabs.
Next steps: The researchers
are now looking for industrial
partners to bring the diagnos-
tic to market.
I n f o r m at I o n t e c h n o lo gy
Car Hacking
computer systems
In modern autos can
pose a securIty rIsk
Source: “experimeNtal
Security aNalySiS of a moderN
automobile”
Karl Koscher et al.
IEEE Symposium on Security and Privacy,
May 16–19, 2010, Oakland, CA
results: A group of research-
ers at the University of Wash-
ington and the University of
California, San Diego, have
demonstrated that it’s pos-
sible to take unauthorized
control of a car’s embedded
computer systems. After
gaining access through the
federally mandated onboard
diagnostics port—located
under the dashboard in
M I C r O S O ft
almost all cars today—they
could disable a vehicle’s
w w w . t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w . c o m
Sept10 FromTheLabs.indd 113
brakes, stop its engine, or
take control of its door locks, easIer 3-d A new
display directs differ-
among other things. ent patterns of light to
Why it matters: A typical each eye to create a
luxury sedan now includes 3-D image.
50 to 70 embedded com-
puters controlled by about
100 megabytes of code. The
researchers wanted to dem-
onstrate the need for added
security at a time when more
of these computer systems
are gaining wireless capa-
bilities. For the most part,
however, the hacks they’ve
performed so far required
physical access to the car. The
possibility of interfering with
a car’s computer remotely is
a concern mainly for future
models.
methods: Without any
special knowledge from the
manufacturer, the research-
ers pulled the hardware from
a car and ran standard secu-
rity analyses such as fuzzing,
which tests software to see
if it’s possible to induce any
glitches or strange behavior.
They used this information to
craft attacks that could take
3-D Without Why it matters: Research-
ers and companies have been
Glasses
over and control systems on trying to develop 3-D dis-
the car’s internal network. a new kInd of dIsplay plays that are more realistic,
They tried out their attacks can delIver 3-d comfortable, and practical
Images dIrectly to
on a parked car and then in than the current technologies,
multIple users
road tests to ensure that they most of which require cum-
were practical in the real Source: “bacKlight for
bersome or expensive eye-
VieW-SequeNtial autoStereo 3d”
world. adrian travis et al. wear. Better ways to deliver
Next steps: Many of the
Society for Information Display 2010
Digest, 215–217
3-D images could lead to new
techniques commonly used consumer devices and more
to protect electronic devices results: Researchers at realistic teleconferencing.
won’t transfer well to cars: a Microsoft created a thin TV methods: The Microsoft
corrupted braking system, for display that can show a 3-D researchers simplified an
example, can’t just shut down. image simultaneously to two existing method of directing
The researchers hope to work viewers, who don’t need to light to a particular viewer.
with manufacturers to develop wear special glasses. The dis- The display is made of a
more appropriate security play can also send each of the plastic wedge with a liquid-
features. viewers a different image. crystal display screen in
from the labs 113
8/6/10 4:37 PM
 front of it. A camera on top
of the display tracks each
viewer’s gaze. Depending on
where the viewer is looking,
30 light-emitting diodes in a
row along the bottom of the
display switch on and off to
direct light into the wedge,
which in turn directs it out of
the LCD screen and toward
a particular eye. The system
can quickly send out light
signals representing as many
as four images. The images
arriving at each of a viewer’s
eyes differ slightly, mak-
ing the video appear three-
dimensional.
Next steps: The group is
looking at other ways to use
the display. If integrated
into the backlight of a laptop
screen, it could provide a way
to toggle instantly between
a private view, in which the
backlight steers the images
toward a single person’s eyes,
and a shared view, in which
the images shine out in all
directions.
m at e r I a ls
Artificial
Antibodies
a polymer bInds to
toxIns In the blood
Source: “recogNitioN,
NeutralizatioN, aNd clearaNce
of target peptideS iN the
bloodStream of liViNg mice
by molecularly impriNted
polymer NaNoparticleS:
a plaStic aNtibody”
yu hoshino et al.
Journal of the American Chemical Society
132: 6644–6645
results: Studies in mice pro-
vide the first evidence that a
lab-made antibody designed
to bind to the bee-sting toxin
114 from the labs
Sept10 FromTheLabs.indd 114
melittin behaves like a natural
antibody in animals.
Why it matters: Antibod-
ies—proteins that bind tightly
to specific targets—are widely
used in diagnostics such as
HIV tests and in treatments
for cancer and other diseases.
But they’re fragile and must
be produced by living organ-
isms, an expensive process.
Stable artificial polymers that
bind to specific molecules
could bring down the price
of medical diagnostics and
broaden access to antibody
therapies.
methods: The research-
ers made a polymer with a
high affinity for melittin by
mixing the toxin with the
polymer’s building blocks
and triggering chemical reac-
tions that link the building
blocks together. The poly-
mer grew around its target so
that it was “imprinted” with
the molecule’s shape. After
being purified and tagged
with a fluorescent molecule,
the polymer was injected
into mice that had previously
been injected with melittin
labeled in a different color.
The researchers then used
fluorescence imaging to track
the molecules’ paths in real
time. They determined that
the artificial antibody bound
to melittin in the blood and
was then carried to the liver,
the same path taken by natu-
ral antibodies.
Next steps: The researchers
will use the same methods to
make “plastic antibodies” that
target other toxins more
commonly associated with
health risks.
Better
Batteries
nanotube
electrodes
delIver more power
Source: “high-poWer lithium
batterieS from fuNctioNalized
carboN-NaNotube electrodeS”
yang Shao-horn et al.
Nature Nanotechnology 5: 531–537
results: A lithium-ion bat-
tery with a positive electrode
made of carbon nanotubes
delivers 10 times as much
power as a conventional bat-
tery and can store five times
as much energy as a conven-
tional ultracapacitor.
Why it matters: Researchers
have been trying to make bat-
tery electrodes from carbon
nanotubes because they are
highly conductive and have a
large surface area, two char-
acteristics that are important
for power density and storage
capacity. Lithium-ion batter-
ies with nanotube electrodes
could extend the range of
electric vehicles and allow elec-
tronic gadgets, including smart
phones, to work longer with-
out recharging.
t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w s e p t e m b e r / o c t o b e r 2010
methods: MIT scientists
made dense, porous nanotube
films by dipping a glass slide
alternately in solutions of posi-
tively and negatively charged
nanotubes. The films were
then heat-treated and incor-
porated into a lithium-ion
battery with a conventional
negative electrode and electro-
lyte. When current was passed
through the battery, lithium
ions reacted with oxygen on
the surface of the nanotubes.
The electrodes’ porous struc-
ture improves energy density
by providing a large number of
reaction sites for the lithium
ions, as well as an easy route in
and out of the electrode.
S E u n g WO O LE E, S h u O C h E n, PAu LA hAM M O n d, An d YAn g S hAO-h O r n
supercharged nanotube
electrodes like the one shown here
in cross-section could boost bat-
tery power.
Next steps: The research-
ers are developing a technique
for spraying the nanotube
solutions on the slide, which
should speed up the process of
making the films from days to
hours. They have licensed the
technology to an undisclosed
battery company.
8/6/10 4:37 PM
 IMAGES OF INNOVATION
82 full-color pages of Technology Review’s most exciting visual technology stories from the past year.

in n ovatio n
ONLY $9.95! + TAX & S/H

o f
imag e s rus h p18
the lith ium
sur fac e n p70
restoratio
on the
Until very recently, industry
the
flat was limited to harvesting
thr ou Gh salt on its surface—like
the piles

tim e traVel
that local
of ordinary table salt
in trucks to
the Brain
p10 workers are loading
with batter-
haul away, below. But
40 percent
ies expected to eat up
law p36 output by
mo or e’s
of the world’s lithium
is now
2020, this remote region
inter-
a focus of intense global
from
est. “If we don’t get lithium
produce
this place, we cannot
a Japa-
our cars,” says Oji Baba,
Mitsubishi.
nese executive with
is high
In the U.S., anticipation
forthcoming Chevy Volt,
for the
miles on
which will run for 40
power alone. But will the
battery
lithium?
Volt ever run on Bolivian
automo-
“For the next five years,

s p e c ial
in lithium
tive won’t make a dent
Mark Verbrugge,
supplies,” says
Sciences
director of the Chemical

is s u e
Labora-
and Materials Systems
it’s any-
tory at GM. After that,
certain, says
one’s guess. What’s
percentage
Verbrugge, is that the
powered by
of vehicles eventually
batteries “could be enormous.”

the Uyuni salt flat:

See more photos of ium
www technologyreview.com/lith
gRound ZeRo A circular
access port affords
a
a 10-meter-diameter glimpse into
target cham- N 27
ber where, in the
coming months, IMAGES OF INNOVATIO
powerful lasers will
be fired with the
goal of setting off
small thermo-
l o g y r e v i e w.
com
nuclear explosions. w w w . t e ch n o
The
beams will enter throughlaser review SPECIAL ISSU
E
ports at the bottom square t e ch n o l o g y
(and
more ports, not pictured, through
OF INNOVATIO at the N
26 top). The circular
IMAGES openings allow
access for instruments
monitor the explosions. that will
into the center of Extending
the chamber is a
camera used to peer
back along the
paths taken by the
beams, examin-
ing mirrors and lenses
for damage.

Igniting Fusion
p h oto e s say

ReseaRche
Rs at a califo
soon attem Rnia natio nal
pt to staRt
sta lab will
Reactions self-s ustain
using the woRl ing fusio n
woRks, it could wo
if it wo d’s laRge
to abun dant be a fiRst step st laseR s.
fusio n powe on the Road

wh e r eh o n es
R.
2008 By kevin bullis
ruary Photographs by
janu a r y / fe b jason madar
a
gy review

c e ll pd ie
t e ch n o l o
56 IMAGES OF
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g o to
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y review SPECIAL ISSU
E

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 38 years ago in tr
Sign of the Times
a year before the oil shock, a geologist
wrote of the coming energy crises
By M ATT M A H O N Ey
I
t was with something like an apology
that Earl Cook, a geologist and execu-
tive secretary of the division of earth
sciences at the National Research Council,
began his December 1972 article for Tech-
nology Review on the energy issues that he
felt people would face in the next millen-
nium. Geologists tend to take the long view
of our existence on this planet, but Cook
worried that his readers would fail to see
the relevance of his points.
It may seem only a pleasant intellectual
excursion without practical significance to
attempt to look either back or ahead on a scale
of centuries at man’s use of energy resources.
Given the exigencies of public decision-making,
this venture may be just an intellectual excur-
sion and nothing more. But bear with me … .
He needn’t have worried: the following
year brought the OPEC embargo, which
revealed how utterly dependent we were on
access to cheap energy. But of course, the oil
shortage caused by the embargo was due to
political conflicts, not geology. What moti-
vated Cook was an idea that was then some-
what novel: that we were fast approaching
the limit of the fossil fuels we could extract
from the earth.
Throughout most of his history as an iden-
tifiable species, man relied on renewable energy
resources for food, heat, protection from other
animals, and to power boats, drive mills, lift
water, and pull plows. Only about 150 years
ago did he start, on a significant scale, to switch
over from wood and wind, from animals and
falling water, to heat and power derived from
the nonrenewable resources which we call the
fossil fuels. In a brief span of little more than
a century, industrial-technological man has
Technology Review (ISSN 1099-274X), Reg. U.S. Patent Office, is published bimonthly by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Entire contents ©2010. The editors seek diverse views, and authors’ opinions do not represent the official
policies of their institutions or those of MIT. Printed by Brown Printing Company, Waseca, MN. Periodicals postage paid at Boston, MA, and additional mailing offices. Postmaster: send address changes to Technology Review, Subscriber
Services Dept., PO Box 16327, North Hollywood, CA 91615, or via the Internet at www.technologyreview.com/customerservice. Basic subscription rates: $39 per year within the United States; in all other countries, US$52. Publication Mail
Agreement Number 40621028. Send undeliverable Canadian copies to PO Box 1051 Fort Erie, ON L2A 6C7. Printed in U.S.A.
116 38 years ago
Sept10 YearsAgo.indd 116
become utterly dependent on nonrenewable
energy resources. Moreover, he has allowed
his and the whole world population to expand
enormously on the basis of a rate of energy
supply that cannot possibly be maintained … .
Cook was careful not to get ahead of him-
self, since he knew that his readers would
have seen no evidence of this imminent cri-
all guzzled up The 1973 oil crisis made
our dependence on fossil fuels all too apparent.
sis as yet. He also acknowledged that we
could defer a crisis by finding ways to get
more energy out of the ground or by devel-
oping technology, like cars with improved
gas mileage, to make better use of it. But he
insisted that none of those solutions would
be permanent. “We are dependent on nonre-
newable resources which have finite quan-
tity limits,” he wrote. In other words, one
way or another, we were going to run out.
The big question then and now is: how
much time do we have? Cook felt fairly cer-
tain that “world crude will not be available
beyond about 2025.” It turns out not to be
as dire as he thought. Oil companies have
pushed back the day of reckoning by drill-
ing in remote places (the oil that poured
into the Gulf of Mexico from a well nearly
a mile below the surface offers testimony of
the lengths, or depths, to which we’ve gone).
The International Energy Agency now pre-
dicts that we won’t reach peak petroleum
production until at least 2020, and that we
may then see a production plateau or slow
decline rather than a calamitous plunge (see
Briefing, p. 87).
Cook argued that even if we could buy
ourselves a few more decades or even a
century, a crisis was inevitable—one that
would threaten the lives of billions around
the world. Although people today tend to
think mainly of how a declining oil supply
would affect the economy, Cook was more
concerned that without abundant fossil fuel
or a renewable replacement for it, the global
population would be unsustainable.
Population is a function of the rate of useful
energy supply, whether or not that energy comes
from renewable or nonrenewable resources. If it
comes from renewable resources, the rate cannot
rise more than briefly above the rate of renewal
and therefore populations tend rather quickly
to become stabilized in ecological equilibrium
with the rate of supply. …
A population based on nonrenewable
resources, on the other hand, faces a much
more formidable instability problem. Its rate
of usable energy supply depends not on man’s
efficiency in extracting energy from a dynamic
system constantly being renewed but upon
the rate he chooses to extract energy from a
static system that is not renewable on any
time scale meaningful to him. The more he
H. AR M STR O N g R O B E RTS /C O R B I S
allows his numbers to become dependent on
this self-chosen rate, the more he faces ultimate
catastrophe.
ABC audited
t e ch n o l o g y r e v i e w s e p t e m b e r / o c t o b e r 2010
8/3/10 9:54 AM
 ACS-hires.pdf 7/29/10 9:49:45 AM

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